SALT LAKE CITY — For better or worse, this year’s Utah Jazz team will likely be compared to last year’s squad throughout the season. That’s what happens when every rotation player save backup Jonas Jerebko is retained.
The Jazz, of course, had good reason to make continuity a priority after going 29-6 over their last 35 games of the regular season and beating the Oklahoma City Thunder in the first round of the playoffs after starting the year just 19-28. Could they have even more success this season with the band back together?
A huge reason for that prosperity over the last half of the campaign was the play of point guard Ricky Rubio. The Spaniard came to Utah via trade after six years with the Minnesota Timberwolves and carried with him a reputation of being a brilliant floor general but a poor shooter.
I know the shots will come. – Ricky Rubio
As the Jazz stumbled nine games under .500 through the first 47 contests, Rubio was as advertised as a shooter, as he made just 40.1 percent of his field goals and just 29.4 percent of his 3-point attempts.
But then a light came on for Utah, as it rolled down the stretch and into the playoffs. In related news, Rubio had one of the best stretches of his career from a scoring standpoint, as he made 49.1 percent of his field goals and a blistering 43.8 percent of his 3-point tries over the Jazz’s final 35 games of the regular season.
Did Rubio turn a corner as a shooter? Could he carry over whatever worked for him down the stretch into this season? Many have assumed the answer to those questions is a rather emphatic “yes.”
But through Utah’s first four games of this season, Rubio has largely struggled from the field. He made five of his 12 shot attempts against the Golden State Warriors on Oct. 19 but otherwise is just 2 of 20 from the field (10 percent). He’s 1-of-7 from beyond the arc and 1 of 13 from two-point territory. Many of the shots he’s missed have been good looks within the flow of the game that he made at the end of last year and needs to make in order for the Jazz’s offense to succeed.
“Small sample size” is one of the most oft-used phrases in the early part of the season, and that’s certainly a fair caveat to use here, but could the same be said for the last half of last season in relation to Rubio’s NBA career as a whole (this is now his eighth season)?
For his career, the Spaniard has made 38.3 percent of his field-goal attempts and 32.4 percent of his 3-point tries, more in line with his production the first half of last season.
“I know the shots will come,” he said before the game against the Warriors. “This team trusts me and Coach trusts me, so I know my game is going to come. It was all summer without playing a professional game for the first time in eight years. Preseason is good, but at the end of the day, when it comes to an NBA game, there’s nothing to replicate that.”
In wins last year, Rubio shot 48.5 percent from the field and 41.1 percent from behind the 3-point line. In losses, it was just 37.3 from the field and 26 from 3. For both Rubio, who is in a contract year, and for the Jazz, made shots need to start coming soon.