MVN - Most Valuable Network

Utah mountain too tall to climb - Bobcats fall late

Utah Jazz 128 Charlotte Bobcats 106

Charlotte went into Salt Lake City with a tall task in front of them; defeat a Utah Jazz team that had only lost 4 home games this season, even against loaded Western Conference. Deron Williams, though clearly behind Chris Paul, is still one of the best point guards in the league, and Carlos Boozer provides a strong offensive presence in the post.

Unfortunately for the bobcats, in the first two quarters of the game, they seemingly only had Jason Richardson to try to match the Jazz firepower. Richardson put up 14 first half points, but the third quarter malaise that has been hounding the ‘Cats arrived a quarter early. Utah let Charlotte hang around until there were 3 minutes left in the quarter and the score was 45-44 Jazz, when they unleashed a 13-0 run, sparked by 8 from Mehmet Okur. The Bobcats committed no turnovers during the run: only missed shots by Jared Dudley, Felton, Richardson, and Matt Carroll, sandwiched around two missed Nazr Mohammed free throws.

The mountain was harder to climb with the near complete absence of the Bobcats’ starting bigs. Mohammed and Emeka Okafor combined for 6 points on 2-4 shooting and 6 rebounds. It should then come as no surprise that Charlotte was outrebounded by 21.

The Bobcats managed to score 28 points in the third, but were unable to control the Jazz front line. With Williams dropping dimes, Boozer, Okur, Andrei Kirilenko, and Paul Milsap were overwhelming. At the end of the third, things looked grim. Utah held a 92-74 advantage.

Then the Bobcats found their stride. With Earl Boykins at the point and Ryan Hollins sparking some energy, the Bobcats were able to reel off a 24-11 run (with 16-16 shooting from the free throw line) to cut the Jazz lead to 3. Suddenly, Kyle Korver awakened from his slumber. Having been held in check in the previous three quarters, Korver his two huge threes to stretch the lead back out to 9, and the Jazz never looked back. Hollins and Jermareo Davidson played the bulk of the minutes up front, with Okafor only coming in after Hollins got smacked in the nose and the bleeding couldn’t be stopped.

Richardson, who finished with 26 points, but also seven turnovers and fouling out, reached a bit of a milestone with his 200th made three this season, keeping him in the league lead (the NBA season record is 269 by Ray Allen in 2005). If he finished the year in this positio, it will be the first time a Bobcat has led the NBA in any statistical category. Still, that’s pretty weak tea for the worst road team in the NBA in the last 4 years.

I hear the Wasatch Mountains are beautiful. Too bad they still are too tough for the Bobcats to climb.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 26th, 2008 at 12:17 am and is filed under Jared Dudley, Jermareo Davidson, Nazr Mohammed, Earl Boykins, Jason Richardson, Utah Jazz, Game Reviews, Raymond Felton, Emeka Okafor, Ryan Hollins, Charlotte Bobcats. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.