VANCOUVER, B.C. - If you think the Utah Jazz should just waltz into G.M. Place tonight and whip the Vancouver Grizzlies, well, you're probably right.
Vancouver has lost 16 times in its last 17 games. The Grizzlies have never beaten the Jazz and have rarely even come close.The Jazz are NBA title contenders with just 24 games left in an effort to win home-court advantage throughout the playoffs. With Portland not letting up and even Midwest Division rivals like Houston and San Antonio getting hot, the Jazz can ill afford a loss at this point to a team the likes of Vancouver.
There is no doubt that the Jazz should whip the Grizzlies on Friday night and then do the same on Saturday at the Pond of Anaheim against the lowly Los Angeles Clippers. The Grizz and Clippers have a grand total of seven wins on the year between them -- with 45 combined losses.
But what should happen and what will happen are sometimes completely different -- especially since the Jazz have had some troubles on the road of late. They blew substantial leads in each of their past two games outside of the Delta Center, losing in overtime to both Charlotte and Detroit.
"We're not playing great basketball," said Karl Malone. "I'm not shooting the ball really well. I'm not in the flow like I want to be. But the most important thing is for us to go out and get a win. We've got Vancouver first and we need to go out and get that win because they're a team that can step up and beat you if you're not ready to play them."
Vancouver, despite that annoying habit of still losing on a regular basis, has been playing pretty well of late, believe it or not. It actually beat a playoff team, the Timberwolves, last Thursday. And even their losses the past 10 days or so have been respectable. For instance, the Grizz took Seattle down to the wire before losing by just two points at Key Arena, and they lost in overtime to both San Antonio and Philadelphia. They also gave the Suns a major challenge before losing by just five points.
So the Jazz -- despite the fact that everyone knows they should win the next couple of games -- are trying not to take the victories for granted.
"We've already let a couple of games get away from us that we should have won," said Bryon Russell. "But we can't worry about those . . . What we need to do now is make sure that we finish each game strong."
The Grizzlies may be without Bryant "Big Country" Reeves, who averages 10.8 points and 5.5 boards per game. He's missed the past two outings with a sore knee and is listed as day-to-day.
But Vancouver will have the young one-two punch of forward Shareef Abdur-Rahim and point guard Mike Bibby, who are the team's two leading scorers. Abdur-Rahim is having a year that would be worthy of all-star consideration -- 23.3 points, 8.6 rebounds per game -- if there were an all-star game this year. Bibby, the fine rookie out of Arizona who was the second overall pick in last June's draft, hasn't disappointed. He's averaging 13.2 points and 6.8 assists.
The Jazz will move on to Southern California on Saturday night to play the team with the worst record in the league. But the Clippers, for some reason, have a thing about beating the Jazz at least once each season. As bad as L.A. has been over the years, the Jazz haven't swept a season series from the Clippers in nine years. Last year Utah lost to the Clippers in their home-away-from home at the Pond in Anaheim, where Saturday's game will be played.
While the next three games will all be on the road for the Jazz, it will actually be two short trips rather than one long one. The Jazz will fly back to Salt Lake City late Saturday night, after the Clippers game, where they'll be able to spend a couple of nights in their own beds before heading back to California to face the Kings in Sacramento on Tuesday.