Jazz 87, Bulls 79
CHICAGO -- The free-throw shooting discrepancy was downright frightful for the Jazz at the half, with Chicago shooting 21 times from the line and Utah just four times in Monday night's meeting at the United Center.But don't even think about hanging this one on the officiating crew of Eddie F. Rush, Mark Wunderlich and Kevin Fehr. The Jazz had no one to blame but themselves for that 21-4 fun fact, and they knew it, too.
"I think we just kind of went with the flow," Jazz guard John Stockton said. "We seemed happy trading baskets with them, (playing) so-so defense and not really executing but hoping to score with them. That makes it hard to get to the free-throw line -- when we're shooting all outside jumpers and not forcing the issue at all."
Added Jazz coach Jerry Sloan: "Everything was just laying outside, just trying to go through the motions. We never put any pressure on them to have to guard us and, consequently, we never got to the free-throw line. . . . They were the ones shooting the free throws because they put pressure on us. If they wanted to catch it in the post, they caught it in the post; if they wanted to catch it on the wing, they caught it there. We didn't push them out of those spots at all. They were everywhere they wanted to be."
That changed in the third quarter, and it is no coincidence that that is when the Jazz outscored the Bulls 23-11 to go from 7 down to 5 up -- a lead they would not relinquish in an 87-79 victory. It's no coincidence, either, that in the second half the Jazz went to the line . . . 31 times.
RECORDS: Jazz 42-20; Bulls 13-39
NEXT UP: Jazz at Cleveland, Thursday, 5:30 p.m. at Gund Arena, Cleveland
Three keys
Jazz decide to play defense after the break, holding turnover-plagued Bulls (24 total) to just 11 third-quarter points
Karl Malone comes up big, scoring 31 and pulling down 13 rebounds
These Bulls just don't have the manpower to stick with the Jazz
Quotable
"Even though they're older, the game hasn't changed." -- Chris Carr on the Jazz's Karl Malone, John Stockton