Bogey Puts Jazz on His Back (Again) For 103-94 Win

Bogdanovic and the Jazz got going in the second half in Memphis. (Brandon Dill via espn.com)

After a very rough first half in Memphis on Friday night, the Utah Jazz found some fire during halftime and fought back from 15 down to win, 103-94. Bojan Bogdanovic posted a second straight 30+ point game as Utah prevented an 0-2 start against the Memphis Grizzlies. Mike Conley struggled again to shoot the ball well while visiting his former team, but he distributed the ball well with four assists and no turnovers. 

The Jazz are still a bit of a mystery. They certainly haven’t wowed very regularly on the offensive end of the floor like some thought they might. In fact, in all but a few stretches, or even large portions of a half, the Jazz offense has looked stagnant and unimpressive. Quin Snyder’s offense relies on playmaking and decisions from positions 1-4 (sometimes 5). It is quite involved and intricate, but the Jazz rely on very smart players to make good decisions. Bogey, Conley, Donovan Mitchell, and Joe Ingles, for example, are all very capable at making reads and getting the ball where it should be.

However, what we have seen lately has been a lot of two things:

1. My turn, my turn offense where many individual players are playing very, well, individually and sometimes forcing bad shots.
2. Too much unselfishness where good shots within the offense are being passed up leading to squandered opportunities and, you guessed it, forcing bad, contested shots. 

There have only been short stretches, as mentioned before, where the movement and passing are taking place and the right reads are being made and the right shots are being taken. 

Some have singled out Donovan for borderline hero-ball type play. Here’s what I’ve seen in more than one game. The team falters out of the gate, struggling to find a rhythm. Multiple players, Donovan included, are passing up open shots. Probably in an attempt to find an even better shot and/or get their teammates involved. The team gets down by 10 to 15 points and suddenly Donovan decides he needs to be Donovan and take over. If he’s successful, he can get things rolling and it jumpstarts the team, at least for a few minutes. If he’s not, he starts jacking up shots until eventually someone else on the team picks things up too. 

In this case, the second half was some of that “being jumpstarted,” but it was also the Bogey show. Earlier this season, I talked about how Bogey is filling a gap in Quin’s offense that hadn’t really been entirely closed after Gordon Hayward departed. Even though Bogey has already shown out it several contests, this game was a prime example of what can be unlocked when the offense is really run through Bogdanovic. And maybe he should be featured even more. 

Rudy Gobert also dominated during the second half, especially on the defensive end where Memphis was limited to only 39 points. He finished with 13 points and 13 rebounds.

The game featured some rotation and set adjustments by Quin. Ed Davis’ return to the Jazz lineup at backup center shifted Jeff Green back to his more natural power forward position, and Emmanuel Mudiay and Dante Exum took turns running the second unit as reserve guards. Perhaps most notably, instead of bringing Mitchell to the bench early to bring him back with the reserves, it was Royce O’Neale who drew that duty on Friday night.

The Jazz aren’t likely to win both (or either) of their upcoming back-to-back games this Sunday and Monday night against the two remaining teams undefeated at home (Raptors and 76ers), but we’ll learn a lot about this team based on how they execute and if any of the momentum from Memphis carries over.