Utah Jazz will clinch third seed with win over Portland Trail Blazers

Wednesday night’s ESPN showdown between the Utah Jazz and Portland Trail Blazers will be a battle for third place in the Western Conference.

This season has been one of ever-changing expectations for the Utah Jazz. After losing Gordon Hayward during the offseason and heading into the start of 2017-18, many Jazz fans were cautiously optimistic. “Hopefully we can sneak into the playoffs, maybe grab the eighth seed – seventh if we’re lucky!” many of them said.

As the season got underway, though, injuries reared their ugly head, the daunting month of December came about and soon Jazz fans were saying, “Wow, I really hope we can turn this around once we get healthy.” As the losses continued to pile up to the point that Utah fell nine games below .500, it wasn’t long before instead of dreaming of playoff positioning, several had changed their expectation entirely to something along the lines of, “I hope we can land a nice draft pick.”

Then, beginning with a stunning overtime victory over the Detroit Pistons on January 24, the expectations slowly began to change once again as Utah racked up win after to win to make it 11 straight leading up to the All-Star break. At that point, with eyebrows elevated and attentions perked, Jazz fans collectively started to say, “Hey now, this playoff thing could actually happen.”

But even after that incredible streak, the Jazz just couldn’t seem to get out of tenth place where they remained stuck for what felt like forever. Combine a couple disappointing losses after the All-Star break and the seemingly non-stop success of the teams around Utah in the standings, and even those with typically high hopes were only uttering, “Just find a way to get in, Jazz! Avoiding seventh or eighth would be great, but just get in!”

But a nine-game win streak elevated hopes one more time, until not only was a playoff spot feasible, but suddenly home court advantage was within reach! And now with one game remaining in the regular season in which Utah will face off against the Portland Trail Blazers, Jazz fans everywhere are saying, “Let’s go get that third seed!”

Yep, you read that right. The Utah Jazz control their own destiny to finish in third place in the Western Conference. All they have to do is come out on top against the Portland Trail Blazers on Wednesday night.

Unfortunately, that will be far from an easy task. The Blazers are reputed as having a deadly home court advantage within the Moda Center, and they have plenty at stake as well. If they win, they’ll finish in third place in the West themselves, an accomplishment they no doubt want to earn.

Not to mention, while the chances are slim (it would require an Oklahoma City Thunder loss to the Memphis Grizzlies and a San Antonio Spurs win over the New Orleans Pelicans), a loss could result in Portland slipping into fifth place and out of home court advantage. No matter how you look at it, you can expect a Portland team that will be firing on all cylinders as they prepare to make a final statement before the playoffs get underway.

Fortunately for the Jazz, the Blazers have cooled off significantly of late. They’ve lost four games in a row, including a pair of heartbreaking losses to both the Denver Nuggets and Dallas Mavericks, which has opened the door for Utah to overtake the third spot. It would appear that the loss of Maurice Harkless to injury has had a seemingly dramatic effect on the team.

Since his last game played on March 25th, the Blazers have gone from a net rating of 1.8 on the season to -0.5. Things have been even worse during their four-game losing streak as their offensive rating has dropped to just 97.9 (compared to 106.2 on the season) and their defensive rating has worsened to 106.9 (compared to 104.3 on the season) for a net rating of -9.1.

In other words, it’s entirely possible that the Jazz may be catching the Blazers at the perfect time. Sure, it’s the second night of a back-to-back for Utah, but after walloping the Golden State Warriors by 40 points on Tuesday night, Utah’s starters got some much-needed rest late in the game. More importantly, though, Utah is surging while Portland has been slumping.

Both teams have a lot on the line and plenty to get up and play for, but at the end of the day momentum is certainly in Utah’s favor.

However, such was also the case in the last meeting between these two teams as it was Portland that was responsible for snapping the Jazz’s 11-game win streak following the All-Star break. Utah had all the momentum, but it certainly didn’t appear that way at the time as the Blazers rolled to a 19-point victory on the Jazz’s home court.

As one would expect, in that contest the Blazers backcourt was electric as Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum combined for 50 points – 26 from McCollum and 24 from Lillard. The Jazz actually did an exceptional job holding Damian to an inefficient night as he went just 7-of-18 from the field and 2-of-7 from deep, but such was far from the case for CJ who went 11-of-21 from the field and a scorching 4-of-7 from three-point land.

If the Jazz are to have any hope of arising victorious in Wednesday’s showdown for the third seed, they’ll have to hold those two in check and receive monstrous performances from their own backcourt duo of Ricky Rubio and Donovan Mitchell. Not only that, but they’ll need to leverage what should be an advantage in the paint between Rudy Gobert and Jusuf Nurkic. Nurkic is a solid player in his own right, but this is a battle that Gobert should be able to win. If he does so, it could very well tip the scale significantly in Utah’s favor.

The coaching battle will be a tight one as both Quin Snyder and Terry Stotts have separated themselves as some of the league’s elite coaches and both deserve to be in the Coach of the Year discussion for the nice turnarounds they’ve helped both their teams go through this season. Expect a chess match between two wise coaches as they lead their teams in a hard-fought battle from start to finish.

As hard as it is to predict who’s going to ultimately come out on top in this crucial contest, I’m going to go ahead and stick with the team that’s had the hot hand – the Utah Jazz. Along with riding a six-game win streak and an epic victory over the Golden State Warriors, the Utah Jazz have won 15 of their last 16 games on the road.

They appear as locked in as they can be and as focused as possible. A Jazz loss almost certainly means falling to fifth place and forfeiting home court advantage (again, assuming OKC beats Memphis), and that’s absolutely a result the Jazz will want to avoid.

Considering how solid they’ve looked of late and how much they know they have at stake, I’m feeling confident that Utah will continue to ride the wave of momentum to go on and clinch the third seed with a thrilling win over the Portland Trail Blazers.

My Prediction: Utah 111, Portland 110

Next: The Utah Jazz dominate at home against the Golden State Warriors

The Jazz and Blazers tip-off at 8:30 PM MT on ESPN for their final game of the 2017-18 NBA regular season.

Following Wednesday’s epic showdown for third place in the West, the Jazz will begin postseason play on either Saturday or Sunday. Be sure to stay glued to TheJNotes.com for all your Utah Jazz playoff coverage!