Utah Jazz: Top 3 hardest stretches on the 2019-20 schedule

The home stretch

After January, as would be the case with any team’s schedule, the Jazz have some ups and downs, some challenges and easy stretches. Overall, February features a lot of home games, albeit with a lot of them coming against talented teams, while March has some tricky stretches, including the aforementioned four-game road trip that concludes with a back-to-back in Boston then Detroit.

But for the most part, February and March look even more navigable than January, which we’ve already settled on not being too grossly overwhelming. However, the final rough stretch comes at a time that could very well be critical for a Jazz team pushing for a high seed in the deadly Western Conference. Utah’s final six games from April 2 – April 14 feature four contests against likely playoff foes that may very well be fighting for positioning, including perhaps with the Jazz themselves.

Those four games include the Portland Trail Blazers, the LA Clippers and, ironically, the Denver Nuggets twice. Each of these teams, particularly the Jazz, Clippers and Nuggets, figure to be fighting for top spots in the conference, so this final stretch could have high significance.

Of course, the end of the season is always a little wonky and can be hard to predict. Teams may already be solidified into a certain seed so resting could be taking place or, depending on what matchups want to be avoided such as perhaps a first-round date with the then healthy Golden State Warriors, for example, there could be some purposeful tanking.

Nevertheless, no matter the circumstances, playing those four games in such a crucial juncture of the season will be difficult and perhaps very meaningful for the Jazz as they look to ramp up for the playoffs and take momentum (and hopefully a high seed) into postseason action. The other two games of those final six are against the Phoenix Suns, who will likely be well on their way to the lottery by that point, and the Oklahoma City Thunder, who probably won’t be a playoff team and may know their fate by then as well.

Still, both of those games will be played on the road (as will one of the games in Denver and the one against Portland), so the Jazz will have to avoid being caught unaware. As we saw this past season where absolutely everything that could go wrong to result in a first-round matchup against the Houston Rockets did eventually go wrong, you can’t take anything for granted down the season’s stretch.

Not to mention, Utah concludes the year on a back-to-back set, with that final game of the season against the Nuggets taking place on the second night in Salt Lake City after playing in Oklahoma City the night before.

With such a tough set of opponents and so much up in the air at that point, the Jazz’s concluding stretch could very well be among their most difficult.

The good news, though, is that despite these spans, as well as a few others scattered throughout the year, being tough, for the most part the Utah Jazz find themselves in a good spot. Even these three hardest stretches feel manageable which is a great change of pace from the unforgiving schedules the Jazz have had to deal with the past two years.