Mitchell Carries Jazz to a Clutch Win in L.A.

The Mitchell-led Jazz pulled away in the clutch. (Mitchell Bernstein via espn.com)

The Utah Jazz visited Los Angeles on Saturday for a possible Western Conference playoff preview — though for their sake hopefully a matchup they wouldn’t encounter until the second-round or the Western Conference Finals. Donovan Mitchell put the Jazz on his back in the clutch to push his team ahead of the Kawhi Leonard and Paul George-led Clippers, 120-107. 

Some on Jazz Twitter have expressed concern about how the Jazz “don’t have any good wins” and are “only beating the bad teams.” That’s not entirely true, although the Jazz’s recent stretch of seven wins in their last eight games had come against sub-.500 opponents, prior to the game against the Clippers. The best team the Jazz played in that stretch before Saturday came against the Heat in Miami, and it was a close loss (by three points). The game in Los Angeles against the Clippers looked to be a good test for a Jazz team that was starting to figure things out. 

Mitchell made tough shot after shot for yet another 30-point night for the third year guard. Mitchell is now the most prolific scorer in Jazz history within their first three seasons since Karl Malone in 1985-88. Mitchell’s clutch play was all the more impressive because he singlehandedly outscored PG and Kawhi combined in the second half, 18 to 17¹. He impressed all around with nine assists and seven rebounds, pushing his season averages even higher. He is already posting career high averages in points, assists, and rebounds. 

The final score and margin of 13 points is also not indicative of the way the game actually went. The Jazz only took full control with a few minutes left, when Mitchell converted three straight clutch attempts. Priot to that, the Jazz had trailed by 10 after the first quarter, but clawed their way back to within two at the half. For the rest of the game it was neck-and-neck.

Mitchell’s driving dunk with 9:18 left put the Jazz ahead for good, and then when the Clippers pulled to within two at 109-107, Mitchell scored six more points from the midrange to lead the Jazz on an 11-0 run to close.

Notably, the Clippers were without Montrezl Harrell, who is dominant on the glass and a flat-out hustler. He likely would have been a tough matchup for either Rudy Gobert, or possibly Bojan Bogdanovic if he had played alongside Ivica Zubac, who helped cause some early struggles for Gobert.

Bogey also struggled this game with a pair of turnovers and more than a few missed shots (6-for-16 from the floor), while Jordan Clarkson impressed in his second outing since joining the team via trade. Clarkson had 13 points off the bench, and seems to provide a needed boost from the second unit. The reserve unit may also have improved simply because the Jazz released Jeff Green, who had struggled to fit in Utah. 

This was a huge win and a positive sign, as the Jazz now have the best start through 32 games in the Quin Snyder era. The next stretch of 10-plus games for the Jazz is the 2nd easiest in the league and an opportunity for the Jazz to make a push for a top-2 seed in the conference. Important to note that at this point in the last two seasons, the Jazz were the same distance out of the 3rd and 5th seed respectively as they are from the 1st seed right now. 

Next up: the Jazz host the Detroit Pistons on Monday night in Salt Lake City..