The Utah Jazz beat the Charlotte Hornets on Friday night but through most of the second half they were without one of their most integral players.
Mike Conley subbed out of the game during a timeout at the 6:58 mark of the third and later headed to the locker room. The Jazz announced during the fourth quarter that Conley would not return because of tightness in his right hamstring.
There was no immediate update after the game as to the severity of Conley’s hamstring issue or his availability for Sunday’s game on the road against the Indiana Pacers.
“We’ll have to wait to get an assessment on where he is from our health and performance staff,” Jazz head coach Quin Snyder said.
Conley is no stranger to hamstring injuries, which can be nagging and hard to manage for anyone. Conley missed 19 games before last season’s All-Star break because of strained left hamstring, an injury that he’s had to deal with before.
Last season during Conley’s absence, the Jazz went on a 10-game win streak, and Conley has admitted time and time again that he struggled through most of the 2019-20 campaign. This season however, Conley has been playing some of the best basketball of his career and has been a difference-maker for the Jazz.
“Mike just has a way of being out there and kind of calming stuff,” Donovan Mitchell said of his teammate after the game on Friday. “We definitely missed that presence on the offensive end, the offensive mind that he has. That was definitely one thing we definitely missed coming down the stretch, just to kind of settle this down in certain instances.”
The Jazz were playing on the second night of a back-to-back against Charlotte, one of three back-to-back sets on their schedule between now and the March 5-10 All-Star break.
Conley has not missed a game this season and was averaging 16.5 points, six assists and 3.6 rebounds this season heading into Friday’s contest, while shooting 40.3% from beyond the arc.