Utah Jazz at Houston Rockets: Keys to earning first road victory

Prediction – Rockets 112, Jazz 104

Unfortunately, based on Utah’s recent performances, I just don’t see everything coming together quite that nicely. Last year they fared well against the Rockets because their defense was solid, but also because they had enough offensive firepower to outmatch them. This year, I’m not so sure that that’s the case. The Jazz may be able to slow Houston down on defense, but I don’t know that they’ll be able to produce the points required to win.

Maybe Rodney Hood will get going or Donovan Mitchell will explode and further solidify himself as Utah’s best offensive option or perhaps a guy like Rudy Gobert or Derrick Favors will have a night to remember. It will absolutely take something like that for the Jazz to win and while any combination of those are entirely possible, there’s also no guarantee that it will be enough.

So, as much as it pains me to say it, I have a feeling that the Jazz will remain winless on the road after tonight and that Houston will be able to pull away from Utah’s strong defense to earn a 112-104 victory.

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From here, the Utah Jazz will be fortunate to have a four-game home stand where, homerism aside, they should have a decent chance of going 4-0. To do so, they’ll still certainly need to work out some critical kinks, especially in their offense, so hopefully they can at least start to show signs of doing so tonight.

The game against Houston will be a tough task, but then the Jazz will have a chance to go on a nice run to bolster their record before heading out on a four-game road trip. There’s no questioning that the next two weeks – a home stand and a road trip – will be very telling for what we can expect about the Jazz moving forward.