Utah Jazz at Phoenix Suns: Keys to the Game

Key Stat – Turnovers

Although the Utah Jazz are riding a stellar three-game winning streak, turnovers have continually plagued them and have helped opposing teams to stay in games. Over the last four games, the Jazz are averaging 15 turnovers per contest. Unfortunately that isn’t actually that much higher than the 13.9 turnovers per game that has become their season average, but it’s much worse than what it was to start the year and significantly higher than what this team is capable of.

And although the Jazz rank 16th in the league in turnovers per contest at 13.9 and the Suns rank 28th with a staunch 16.2 per game, you wouldn’t have known such was the case in these two teams’ last meeting.

In their New Year’s Eve bout, the Jazz turned the ball over 15 times compared to Phoenix’s nine. These miscues led to 16 easy points for the Suns.

It should also be noted that the Suns’ turnover average may be a bit misleading given that they play at the third fastest pace in the league. With more possessions per game, naturally your turnover figures will be somewhat higher.

However, that ought to go both ways. With Utah playing at the league’s slowest pace, you’d expect them to do a much better job of taking care of the basketball.

So if the Jazz hope to stop the underdog Suns from earning a win on their home court, they’ll have to do a much better job of avoiding turnovers while also attempting to use Phoenix’s fast pace against them so that they commit more than their season average.