Analysis: Mike Conley’s impact in an overtime win against the Pelicans, plus thoughts on Walker Kessler and Nickeil Alexander-Walker

The Utah Jazz knew that they were going to get a more physical, more energized, more focused version of the New Orleans Pelicans on Thursday night.

After beating the Pelicans on Tuesday, snapping their seven-game win streak that put them at the top of the Western Conference standings, the Jazz knew that it was going to be a tough battle.

“We talked all yesterday and this morning about how we know that’s a really good team, we know they’re well coached,” Jazz head coach Will Hardy said.

“We know they have a lot of pride and they’re playing really good basketball, so we did not expect in any way to lead tonight’s game wire-to-wire. We knew it was going to be a long 48 minutes which turned into 53 minutes.”

Despite the challenge, the Jazz hung on for just long enough, and behind a combined 70 points from Jordan Clarkson and Lauri Markkanen, they beat the Pelicans 132-129 in overtime.

Mike Conley is the Jazz’s most important player

Markkanen is clearly the best player on the Jazz roster, but Mike Conley might be the most important.

Having a player with Conley’s understanding of the game and ability to read a defense and change the tempo has enormous value.

“Definitely, Mike is probably our most important player,” Rudy Gay said of his teammate. “He keeps us in games, as you can see.

“When he was (injured), we were in the game, but at the end we didn’t have that kind of direction. Games like this, you really see the difference.”

Look at the way that Conley draws both Zion Williamson to the right side of the court along with Herb Jones, the Pelicans’ best perimeter defender. Conley does this specifically to get Clarkson open — to make sure that Clarkson, who has been hot all night, will have a clear look.

“Mike manipulated a lot of that stuff on the court, getting me in situations where I had the advantage,” Clarkson said. “He’s a true point guard, a guy that gets everybody shots, a guy that can really slow the game down when he sees there’s a moment where we kind of just out of control and doing wild stuff like I always do...When it comes to a point guard like, it’s rare that you get those kind of guys.

“He’s a rare player. He’s been one of my favorite players ever since I’ve been in the league, just watching how he does stuff, and I’m just happy I’m next to him on the court.”

Even in the most chaotic of moments, Conley calms things when other players might buckle or might not know what the smart thing to do is. Like for example on the below play when Clarkson dribbles the ball off his own foot and the play is broken.

Clarkson has to dive to save the ball, but as soon as he gets it into Conley’s hands, Conley calmly penetrates to draw in the defense and makes a perfect scoop pass out to Markkanen for a huge 3.

If not for Conley’s cool head and understanding of how to read the game and understand which defenders to use on a switch and which players to involve in a play, the Jazz might not have been able to keep the game tight at the end of regulation and then pull things out in overtime.

Conley continues to do things like this in every game, and even if he’s not the Jazz’s leading scorer, he’s almost certainly the most impactful, especially in clutch situations.

Walker Kessler to close the game

When it came to deciding who would close the game at center, through regulation and in overtime, and who Hardy would use his lone coaches challenge on to make sure that he wouldn’t foul out, Hardy decided to go with rookie Walker Kessler.

“He was in the flow of the game, if that makes sense,” Hardy said. “He helped us change our defense a little bit by challenging at the rim. Obviously the guys on the ball did a much better job of not getting beat with Zion’s first step.

“But, you know, I felt like he was doing a good job on that end, and then on the offensive end, he continues to learn how to help us whether he’s screening or spacing. Obviously getting a couple lobs, cutting on the baseline, those are big plays for us as well as getting on the glass, so it was a night where I just felt like the matchup suited Walker and I thought he did great.”

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Gaining the trust of a coach to be able to close a game, especially a game that is as close as Thursday’s was, is no small feat. I don’t expect for Kessler to be Hardy’s choice to close every game and the matchups are certainly going matter, but it really is a big deal that Kessler is doing so well in his rookie campaign.

Even Kessler was a little surprised when Hardy called his name and that he never took him out, but he is up for the challenge and is making the most of every opportunity.

Extended thoughts on Nickeil Alexander-Walker

First of all, Nickeil Alexander-Walker was pretty exceptional on Thursday night.

“I thought he had some great possessions on C.J. (McCollum), who was unequivocally killing us there for a little bit,” Hardy said.

Alexander-Walker’s defense continues to be impressive, and Hardy even put him into the game on the final defensive possession of the game, which says a lot about how good he was.

I’ve written before about how Alexander-Walker’s decision-making, passing, shot selection and efficiency have all improved dramatically this season. Every time that he gets extended time on the court this year, he makes more of a case that he is a useful and impactful player.

What’s on my mind where he’s concerned is how his role is going to figure into the Jazz’s rotation as we move forward. He has been getting a lot of minutes lately because of injuries to Conley and Collin Sexton. With Sexton still sidelined with a hamstring strain, Alexander-Walker is clearly getting some extra run, but what happens when Sexton comes back?

I’m not saying that Alexander-Walker should be playing over Sexton, I’m just genuinely curious about what will happen, and also curious about how that’s going to impact Alexander-Walker, so I asked him if he thinks about what will happen.

“I am very conscious of everything,” he said, “but I’m starting to understand that people have their time — time and moments. For instance, this is Lauri’s time, and my job is to support him to be a great teammate. And God willing I’ll have a time to shine, and I hope they do the same for me.”

Alexander-Walker has had the absolute right mentality and the right amount of engagement and the right approach even through not getting playing time and his minutes being inconsistent, but now that there is a good chunk of data that shows how useful he can be, I wonder how Hardy will deal with that moving forward.