Utah Jazz: Five takeaways from victory over Orlando Magic

Donovan Mitchell and Bojan Bogdanovic light it up

Donovan Mitchell was dominant in the first half, jumping out to 13 quick points. Orlando simply had no answer for him every time he broke free on a drive to the bucket.

In the second half there were double and even triple teams drawn by Spyda Skywalker, and it led to open looks for all four guys on the perimeter. My favorite play of the game was in the third quarter when Mitchell initiated the blender offense .

He drove to the rim and started going up for one of his acrobatic layups, but instead kicked it out to Bojan Bogdanovic who was open in the left corner. Bogey waited for a defender to close out before kicking it to Joe Ingles on the left wing, who swinged a pass to Royce O’Neale across the court and found Donovan wide open for an automatic right corner three.

The Jazz kept the defense guessing on whether the ball being shot or passed. Any one of those players with the ball on that possession could have taken a shot and it would have counted for a good look in my opinion; but the best part of unselfish basketball is giving up good looks for great looks. That’s what Utah did, and it paid off with three extra points on the scoreboard.

Meanwhile Bogdanovic was there for the Jazz all game. He only had one turnover and was constantly involved in the Jazz’s efficient offensive possessions. Bogey and Mitchell tried to get going to dig the Jazz out of the hole they dug themselves in crunch time (more on that later), but a monster dunk from Spyda Mitchell ended a three minute scoring drought for Utah and gave them the energy boost they needed to earn the victory.

A couple minutes after the dunk Bojan Bogdanovic went down going for a rebound after a free throw attempt from the Orlando Magic. The play was reviewed and confirmed that Bogey was fouled, and on the Jazz’s ensuing possession they cut their deficit down to three points from a Bogdanovic triple.

Bogey scored 12 points in the fourth quarter, and Mitchell poured in 10. They both scored 30 points on the night, becoming the first Jazz duo to accomplish such a feat since 2008.

Ever since I wrote about Mitchell needing to remodel his offensive attack, he has averaged 27.2 points per game on 52.8 percent shooting from the field. The Jazz have won four out of those five games, and Mitchell has been directly tied to Utah’s success all season long.

Bogdanovic has struggled to clear 40 percent from the field over the same five game span, but still finds himself averaging over 20 points per game. If he keeps that up then the Utah Jazz will have their first team with two players averaging 20 + points a game since Karl Malone and Jeff Malone did it in 1991-92.