Utah Jazz-GSW: Salt Lake City’s #nightlife is winning basketball

The Utah Jazz performed a miracle in their new duds, dismantling the Golden State Warriors at Vivint Smart Arena.

Stephen Curry and the Golden State Warriors got a major dose of the Salt Lake City #nightlife on Tuesday. It was as bad as they’ve claimed — a 129-99 smackdown at the hands of the Utah Jazz. Golden State started out lackadaisically, while the Jazz came out as red-hot as their new City Edition uniforms.

The result was the largest loss for the Warriors since February of 2016. Ricky Rubio led the way for the Jazz with 23 points, 11 assists and five rebounds.

There really isn’t anything noteworthy to say about the Warriors dismal performance. The best highlights on that end were probably Javale McGee’s hyper-athletic dunks, if that tells you anything.

Their defensive lapses were very un-Warriors-esque. Check out the three 3-point shots from Jinglin’ Joe Ingles, the third best three-point shooter by percentage. Golden State let him take wide-open shots as if they didn’t know who he was —

https://twitter.com/utahjazz/status/958561295132848130

As a team, the Jazz also were shooting an incredible 50 percent from distance, hitting 14-of-28 attempts on the night.

Numerically, this wasn’t the Jazz’s best overall victory. But when you consider the competition, it certainly tops the chart. The Jazz posted an offensive rating of 129.3 and a defensive rating of 99.2 in the game. Both of those are elite numbers.

The Impact of Rudy Gobert

Since Rudy Gobert has returned from injury, Utah’s defense has been exactly what we thought it would be. During the team’s current three-game win streak, including wins over the Toronto Raptors and Golden State, the D-rating checks in at 95.8.

Obviously, that rating won’t hold up through the end of the year. However, there’s still a chance for Utah to finish the 2017-18 campaign as the league’s the No. 1 defensive team as long as Gobert remains healthy.

This victory was one for the books and took an entire team effort, but we can’t forget Ricky Rubio. This was arguably the floor general’s best game of the year. Even better than his 30-point outing in an eary-season overtime win over the Portland Trail Blazers.

The last few games, Rubio has finally looked like the Jason Kidd-lite that we thought he could become. Let’s hope something has finally clicked and it’s not just a hot-streak.

The Jazz take on the Phoenix Suns this Friday, looking for their fourth straight victory.