Utah Jazz 2017-18 Week 24 Outlook, Predictions

The Utah Jazz face a trio of meaningful games with just eight left in the regular season as they head into Week 24 of NBA action.

Last week didn’t exactly go as Utah Jazz fans had planned. Instead of keeping the nine-game win streak alive by adding a tenth victory, the Jazz instead fell in disappointing fashion to the hapless Atlanta Hawks. They were able to bounce back just fine in the subsequent game against the Dallas Mavericks before falling in heartbreak fashion to the San Antonio Spurs a day later.

The Jazz then went on to close the week with an easy victory over the Golden State Warriors who were playing without their four stars – Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green – who were all dealing with injury or illness. Fortunately, Utah’s 2-2 performance was still good enough to keep them in seventh place in the West heading into this week thanks to a surprising Minnesota Timberwolves loss to the Memphis Grizzlies last night.

And while the loss to Atlanta came as a surprise to me and pretty much everyone, I had actually predicted last week that Utah would fall to San Antonio, meaning that while Utah finished .500 for the week, I managed to go a slightly better 3-1 in my projections. That elevated my season-long record to 41-33 while the Jazz settled at 42-32.

And now with just eight games remaining in the regular season, every contest is extremely vital as the Jazz look to climb as high as they possibly can in the Western Conference standings prior to the start of postseason. Utah faces a tough trio of games in the week ahead, so they’ll need to play much more like they did during their recent nine-game win streak than how they did in a 2-2 stretch last week.

They’ll start out the week on Wednesday against the Boston Celtics, who much like the Golden State Warriors, are looking pretty beat up right now with injuries to the likes of Kyrie Irving and Marcus Smart. Then they’ll take on the Memphis Grizzlies, who have been pretty awful of late, but their two latest wins have come against the Wolves and Denver Nuggets, so the Jazz will have to be cautious.

Last of all, they’ll conclude Week 24 with the most daunting and probably the most important game of the week as they’ll hit the road to take on the Minnesota Timberwolves. These two teams are currently neck and neck in the standings, and there was some clear bad blood between the two of them in the previous contest which could lead to a heated and intense battle on Sunday.

None of these three games is a ‘gimme’ and each one will be necessary if the Jazz are to stay ahead of Minnesota (as well as the teams trying to work their way back into the playoff mix) in the standings and potentially surge even higher. Let’s take a closer look at how the Jazz ought to fare in each of these three crucial bouts.