The Utah Jazz ended 2007 with something they needed: a win. In particular, this was a 111-101 win at home against the Portland Trail Blazers who had beat them twice this month.
Carlos Boozer (19 points, 9 rebounds) and Deron Williams (18 points, 8 rebounds) played their usual. It was Andrei Kirilenko who really carried the Jazz, with 14 points, 8 rebounds and 7 assists, just shy of a a triple double. Memo Okur is still slumping, scoring only 6 points and pulling down a single rebound in 21 minutes. Ouch.
Paul Millsap is getting Okur's time, scoring 14 and 6 rebounds. The way Okur is playing, they should start Millsap at the power forward and move Boozer to the center.
The Trail Blazers were led by LaMarcus Aldridge who had 36 points and an unreal three rebounds. Aldridge is going to be a good player but needs to be more aggressive on the boards. Brandon Roy added 17 points and Jarret Jones added 15.
The free throw differential wasn't as bad as it had been during the month; Portland only had 16 more opportunities.
Kyle Korver also made his Jazz debut with 11 points, and pretended he was Kirilenko by adding 2 blocks and 2 steals to hsi statline. He looked like he was playing really well and fitting into Utah's system very well. He also played adequate defense which would lead me to believe one of the two things:
- Korver didn't care about playing defense back with the Sixers.
- Korver has already realized that the only way to get consistent minutes in a Jerry Sloan team is to play hard.
Either way, I'm really liking his addition to the team. Korver gets to play his old team on Wednesday, as the Philadelphia Seventy Sixers come to the Energy Solutions Arena. Happy new year and enjoy the NHL Winter Classic!
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