Key #1 – Win the Turnover Battle
Saturday’s Jazz-Lakers bout has the potential to be a sloppy affair as it will feature the two teams in the league that, entering Friday’s slate of games, just so happen to find themselves at the bottom of the NBA in turnovers per game. Utah’s giving the ball away 19 times per contest whereas the Lakers are giving it away 19.5 times. Furthermore, Utah is dead last in the league in total turnovers at 95.
That’s far from a recipe for success. Especially considering that the Jazz are playing at the second slowest pace in the league so far and already have a struggling offense as it is, the fact that right around 20 percent of their possessions are ending in turnovers is an awful, awful sign. Ricky Rubio has been the primary culprit at 4.6 giveaways per game. However, he at least balances that out with 8.2 assists and two steals per game.
The next two leaders in turnovers on the Jazz squad – Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell – aren’t exactly in that same boat though. Gobert’s committing three such miscues per game whereas Mitchell is turning it over 2.2 games per game, and let’s just say their assist and steal numbers aren’t exactly doing much to help balance that out.
No other story than the turnovers tonight. Jazz have turned it over 25% of their possessions with 2:42 left in the 3rd quarter. Down by 17
— David Locke (@DLocke09) October 26, 2017
Therefore, against a lackluster, but still dangerous young Lakers team, the Jazz will absolutely need to find a way to reverse this trend if they hope to get out of their mini-slump and remain undefeated at home. Not only that, but they’ll have to hope that what’s been a shared weakness for both them and the Lakers can be patched up on their end but capitalized upon in regards to their opponent.
Given that LA has committed the most turnovers per game of any team in the league and is giving up the third most amount of points off of those turnovers (23.5 per contest), the Jazz will absolutely have to take advantage and hope that those miscues can spark their offense that has been stagnant of late. The Lakers will be coming into Saturday’s game on the second night of a back-to-back after facing Toronto on Friday, so there’s a good chance they’ll be tired and more apt to commit such mistakes.
Which leads in perfectly to Key #2…