The Utah Jazz will look to take advantage of a weary and banged-up Houston Rockets team to win the regular season series and leapfrog them in the standings.
With Friday’s Utah Jazz victory over the Atlanta Hawks and the Houston Rockets defeat at the hands of the Denver Nuggets, the Jazz and Rockets now find themselves essentially tied in the Western Conference standings. At 29-22, Houston has the slightly better record by mere percentage points (.569 vs. .566), but both are deadlocked at seven games out of first place.
If not for that small discrepancy in win percentage, the Jazz would actually be ahead of the Rockets due to the fact that Utah leads the regular season series 2-1. But that’s far from an important issue considering that with Utah and Houston facing off on Saturday night, if the Jazz win, they’ll be instantly propelled ahead of the Rockets into sixth place in the West.
As expected, the West has been an absolute gauntlet this year with only four games separating the third through seventh seeds. Utah has reached as high as sixth recently with chances to go even higher, but between a sprinkling of disappointing losses, such as Wednesday’s in Portland, to hot streaks of teams above them in the standings like San Antonio, Portland and OKC, it’s been hard to make much real progress.
But a win against Houston on Saturday would certainly be a good first step to making that advance. The Utah Jazz got a much-needed victory on Friday over Atlanta as Rudy Gobert, fresh off his All-Star snub, came out with a vengeance. He finished the game with 25 points on a perfect 7-of-7 shooting from the floor to go along with 13 rebounds and a pair of blocks.
A day after finding out he was left off the All-Star team, Rudy Gobert had himself a game 💪 pic.twitter.com/FCQSJ5awjG
— NBA on ESPN (@ESPNNBA) February 2, 2019
The Jazz will need him to continue his revenge tour if they are to slow a dangerous Houston Rockets team and solidify their spot back in sixth in the West. Fortunately for Utah, there are a few aspects of this upcoming matchup that should make it advantageous for the Salt Lake City squad.
First of all and most obviously, the game is being played on Utah’s home court where they’ve been exceptional of late. The Jazz have won nine of their last 10 contests within Vivint Smart Home Arena and post an overall record of 16-9 there this season, which is great considering their slow start.
Also, while it’s the second game in as many nights for both teams, Houston comes in after a drubbing in Denver for a much more challenging road back-to-back. Between tired legs and a late flight, it wouldn’t be surprising to see the Rockets short on energy and luster in this battle.
Furthermore, the Rockets will definitely be without big man Clint Capela who is still recovering from thumb surgery and multiple sources have indicated that Chris Paul is likely to be resting as well as the team wants to take no chances rushing him in to back-to-back contests due to his recent hamstring strain. He was also experiencing lower back soreness leading up to the game against the Nuggets, so it’s perfectly understandable why Houston would want to err on the side of caution.
Rockets guard Chris Paul will "probably" sit out Saturday night in Utah, coach Mike D'Antoni said. Houston is hesitant to have Paul play both ends of back-to-backs, particularly so soon after returning from a hamstring strain.
— Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) February 2, 2019
With no Capela and no Paul in action, the Jazz will of course have to do everything possible to slow down the incredibly prolific James Harden. Harden has pretty much carried the Rockets on his shoulders this season with a herculean effort to keep them in the midst of the playoff picture. Though he narrowly had his streak broken on Friday, Harden extended his number of consecutive games with 30-plus points to 25.
He’ll be looking to keep up that trend and maintain his recent dominance against the Jazz on Saturday. However, so long as the Jazz can keep him in check to the best of their ability, I like their chances of coming away victorious. Harden may very well still extend his 30-point streak, but if the Jazz can keep him off the foul line and force him into an inefficient night, they could very well defeat him and his wounded Rockets squad.
Earlier in the week, I pinned the Rockets as winners in this one. However, considering their injury situation, their loss in Denver last night and subsequent travel to Salt Lake City, and the motivated Rudy Gobert that should be present due to his snub, I’m going to change my tune this time around. This should still be a close contest – it’s never easy to get a win against a James Harden-led team – but I’m leaning towards optimism and picking Utah to come out on top.
My Prediction: Jazz 110, Rockets 107
This is a contest that Jazz fans won’t want to miss as it could mark the beginning of a major surge up the standings as they aim to leapfrog the Rockets. Not only that, but a win would give Utah an important 3-1 series victory over Houston to earn the tiebreaker over them in potential seeding situations. The two teams tip-off at 7:00 PM MT at Vivint Smart Home Arena.