ATLANTA — While the Utah Jazz (16-11) may be in the process of learning to become a more cohesive unit as a team with the addition of eight new players over the summer, they are still in firm playoff contention at this point in the season. The Atlanta Hawks (6-22), on the other end, are working to become a playoff squad with a roster of young, talented players that still have a lot to learn about playing winning basketball at the professional level.

The Jazz and the Hawks square off Thursday evening at State Farm Arena in downtown Atlanta. For Hawks coach Lloyd Pierce, he knows his young team will have its hands full trying to score on a Utah team whose main philosophy is predicated on playing tough defense that also happens to have the best defender in the league standing firmly between opponents and the basket.

“The beauty of Utah is you have the defending Defensive Player of the Year in Rudy Gobert and one of the things you understand is, ‘If I funnel everything down to a guy I know is going to protect the rim, I’ve done half the battle,’” he explained following shootaround at the Emory Sports Medicine Complex in Brookhaven, Georgia. “You know where the big guy is at all times. If I’m on Utah’s team, new player or old player, I walk into the gym saying, ‘All right, I got a rim protector back there.’’’

Pierce noted that even with a relatively large group of new players in uniform this season, the Jazz can rely on having a elite defender help them if they make mistakes as they learn Quin Snyder’s complicated defensive schemes — a luxury not every team has.

Pierce also said the Jazz have good players who can make plays on offense that gives Utah numerous options to score and create lots of problems for opponents on defense. But the main issue for his team will be scoring against a stout core of Jazzmen.

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“They’ve got good defenders. Joe Ingles is a good defender. Donovan (Mitchell) is a good defender. Royce O’Neale is a good defender,” Pierce said. “They’re going to make you work and nothing is going to be easy around the basket, so you do want to try and score when you get those early opportunities (in the shot clock). They just don’t provide them for you.”

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