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SALT LAKE CITY — Lauri Markkanen and Kelly Olynyk had an idea.
The Utah Jazz were on a rare four-day break, which featured an even more rare chance of getting in back-to-back practice days. So the two players — which Jazz coach Will Hardy referred to as the team's "senior council" — came to their coach with a suggestion: Why don't they try out some zone coverage again?
"We definitely advocated for it," Olynyk said. "I mean, we were probably one of the tallest front courts in the NBA."
The thought was that due to Utah's size up front they'd be able to pull off a trapping and chaotic defense, and still be in a good enough position to rebound. But they needed to get their coach on board, too.
They had an idea, and Hardy listened.
"We decided to bring it back and work on it some more," Hardy said. "We worked on it the last couple days of practice and thought it'd be a fun opportunity to try to bring it out."
Though, the timing for it wasn't all that fun. The Jazz trailed by 19 points to to the Boston Celtics in the first half on Saturday, mostly due to their base coverage failing to get any top of stops. So Hardy called a timeout and Utah came back out with a unique zone coverage.
The immediate result was a 23-5 run that brought the Jazz back into the game. The end result was a 118-117 win over the Boston Celtics.
So what exactly was it?
It was a variation of a 1-3-1 zone that featured a lot of trapping, switching and playing the passing lanes. Against Boston, the main goal was to get the ball out of Jayson Tatum's hands. The Jazz were ultra aggressive in sending a help defender at Tatum and forced him to give up the ball., and it worked; Tatum was just 4-for-12 from the field.
"Hopefully, we can just keep getting better at it and have that tool in our toolbox to pull out whenever we see fit," Olynyk said.
It won't be Utah's new base defense, but in some situations — like against a shallow Boston team — it could help the Jazz handle some of the elite scorers in the league. And it provided some extra excitement heading into the game.
"Guys we're excited just to mix it up," Markkanen said. "Obviously, it's still not perfect, but we flew around the floor on the defensive end and got some stops and messed their rhythm up."
It was fun and different, and clearly caught the Celtics off guard.
Will it be effective against a more prepared team? Time will tell. On Saturday, though, it was the key to the Jazz win; and it demonstrated the trust between players and coach that has been the bedrock of a scrappy, young Jazz team that has had surprising success this season.
When two veterans came to him with an idea, Hardy took it to heart. That fact meant a lot to the team.
"He's awesome. He's super open-minded. He's an outside-the-box thinker, loves that kind of stuff, and all the different opportunities and possibilities," Olynyk said of Hardy. "I think he's someone who you can approach and really take your suggestions into consideration."
Olynyk used the example of a suggestion box at a restaurant or business. If he put something in one of those, he doesn't know if it actually is going to be read by anyone. But "Will's reading every one of them," Olynyk said.
That's what he did earlier this week, and that's why the Jazz are back in play-in position.
