NW Check-In: Jazz’s Margin For Error is Shrinking Against Division Rivals

Joe Ingles scoops in an easy lay-up in a win over the Portland Trailblazers in December (NBA.com)

Early in the season, I previewed the Utah Jazz’s journey through the toughest division in basketball, analyzing the competition and rivals in the brutal Northwest Division. We’re a little past the midway point of the season and the Jazz are heading into a stretch of their schedule with a slew of division rivalry games. The Jazz faced Portland on Monday night in the first of this division-heavy stretch, and they still have four more consecutive games ahead against their Northwest peers.

Pre-season previews:

Jazz-Thunder

Jazz-Wolves

Jazz-Nuggets

Jazz-Blazers

The Jazz suffered a narrow loss at home to a very tough Blazers team who are only the third best team in the division–at least in terms of record. The Jazz are currently sitting at fourth in the division, but there’s still a chance they could end up in second, or even at the top. 

On Wednesday, the No. 2 seed Denver Nuggets visit, followed by a weekend home-and-away with the Timberwolves. Then the Jazz close off the division stint in Portland for a rematch with the Blazers. 

This stretch could prove crucial to the Jazz’s homecourt hopes — or even playoff hopes. 

What’s happened so far?

At roughly the midway point the Jazz have played, and lost, a few division games for a division record of 2-5. That really isn’t ideal in a tight playoff race as that can become a tiebreaker for playoff seeding. Their two wins have come in a pair of blowout wins over the Blazers in December, before Monday’s tough loss. Against the other three teams, Utah is 0-4.

The two losses to OKC and the loss to Denver all came in blowout fashion, though the scores didn’t always indicate that near the end. The loss to Minnesota was close, but came at the hands of a resurrected Derrick Rose in a game the Jazz had the advantage due to injuries and absences on Minnesota’s end.

The results so far:

• Denver: 0-1
• OKC: 0-2
• Portland: 2-1
• Minnesota: 0-1

What’s ahead?

Beyond this week’s division-heavy stretch of games against Denver, Minnesota, and Portland, the Jazz still have two remaining games against Denver (February 28 and April 9), one with Minnesota (March 14), and two with OKC (February 22 and March 11). Despite the 2-5 start, the Jazz are also still in position to possibly win three of the four season series, or at least tie in the case of the Thunder. 

In my prediction pieces, I predicted a tie with the Thunder, and a 3-1 rout of the Wolves, Nuggets, and Blazers. 

Denver has proven to be a big surprise to many this season after seemingly making a leap after being on the outside looking in come playoff time last spring. That said, the race was close and they were only a couple games out of the third seed,  so we may have all been a little too easily deceived and that 3-1 series win may prove the most difficult prediction to fulfill.

The Jazz will also need to close out their remaining division games to reach the predictions that I gave. It’s not that I don’t think the  Jazz are capable of it, I really do. But it would be really naive of me to bet on an outcome that has absolutely no margin for error. And before they get to close out the rest of these series, the Jazz need to first take care of business against Denver and the rest of this stretch.

If they can do that, they’ll put themselves into great position heading into February for a much easier schedule and plenty of home games to look forward to playing winning.