#4 The onslaught of missed threes
During the regular season, the Utah Jazz shot a respectable 35.6 percent from three, good for 10th in the NBA. However, in the playoffs, they went an abysmal 26.3 percent. That was the worst mark among all the playoff teams and quite frankly an embarrassing blemish for the team.
To make matters worse, while the Rockets executed well on defense, it’s not like they deserve some ungodly amount of credit. The fact of the matter is that the Jazz simply couldn’t buy a long-range basket, contested or otherwise. On wide open threes, the Jazz shot 26-of-110 (23 percent), a bone-chillingly horrific mark.
The final numbers are in: the Jazz shot 26-110 (23%) on wide-open (defender at least 6+ ft away) threes in the UTA/HOU series.
— Andy Larsen (@andyblarsen) April 25, 2019
The Rockets went 43-95 (45%). The notoriously bad shooters in OKC shot 33-81 (40%) on wide open shots in their series.
Despite being as wide open as could be, the Jazz continually failed to knock down the threes they needed to stay alive and compete with Houston’s high-powered offense. Kyle Korver shot 33.3 percent. Jae Crowder went 30 percent. Joe Ingles was 27.6 percent while Donovan Mitchell was at 25.6 percent. Meanwhile, Ricky Rubio went a horrible 20 percent from three while Thabo Sefolosha was at 12.5 percent. Yikes, yikes, triple yikes. Royce O’Neale, who is a good but not great 3-point shooter, led the team at a mediocre mark of 34.8 percent.
Needless to say, had the Jazz and their purported reliable sharpshooters been anywhere close to even average, they could have very well turned this series around and competed at a whole other level. Failing to do so was a massive disappointment.