At 14-7, the Utah Jazz are enjoying a solid 2021-22 season so far, but a dominant December should be at the top of every Jazzman’s Christmas list. After all, this team still holds the potential to upgrade from solid to dominant.
Luckily, the Jazz’s upcoming December slate is reasonably forgiving. With a number of lottery bound teams and a minimal number of back-to-backs over the season of giving, we’ll be predicting a lot of wins in this article.
All the Jazz need to do now is execute, and make us look good in the process.
Predicting every Utah Jazz game in December
December 3 vs Boston Celtics: Win
The Boston Celtics may be a legendary franchise, but they’ve gotten off to a fairly uninspiring start to 2021-22 so far. They are fresh off a win against the Philadelphia 76ers but they’re also not far removed from dropping a low scoring affair to the middling San Antonio Spurs, and a 123-104 blowout vs the Brooklyn Nets.
Meanwhile, the Utah Jazz have won their last two contests by 22 points. They seem to be on a roll. They’ve been better in the short and longer term than the Celtics this season, and that trend figures to continue heading into tomorrow night’s matchup.
December 5 vs Cleveland Cavaliers: Loss
Arguably, predicting a loss for the Utah Jazz in this contest is overly pessimistic. Time will tell. This Jazz squad has made an unfortunate habit of playing down to their competition, and the 11-10 Cavaliers may be one of the league’s worst teams to make that mistake against.
Bucking every modern notion of NBA basketball, the Cavs frequently deploy a triple towers lineup by starting Jarrett Allen, Evan Mobley and Lauri Markkanen in their frontcourt. The length advantage that the Jazz typically enjoy with Rudy Gobert in the middle may be neutralized in this contest.
If the Jazz focus and execute, they’ll have a great chance to emerge from this contest with a victory. Given their performances against talented-but-lesser opponents over the course of the season so far, we’re hedging our bets against that outcome here.
December 8 vs Minnesota Timberwolves: Win
Given our previous prediction, one may have expected us to predict a loss in every game the Jazz play against a lesser opponent. We’re not data scientists, but that seems like a pretty bad projection model.
Look for the Jazz to correct course after a tough loss to the Cavaliers and come prepared for this matchup with the upstart young Pups.