Trail Blazers at Jazz
The Utah Jazz attempt to halt a season-worst, five-game losing streak when they host the Portland Trail Blazers on Friday. One of the losses came against the Trail Blazers when Portland All-Star guard Damian Lillard scored 51 points in last Saturday's 124-107 home victory.
The Jazz gave up 124 or more points in three of the losses but the defense wasn't the problem Wednesday when the Denver Nuggets - who had just seven available players - posted a 98-95 win in Salt Lake City. "There's no way for us to be who we want to be and who we have been and lose this game," Utah All-Star guard Donovan Mitchell told reporters after his team blew a 15-point, third-quarter advantage. Portland has won six of its past eight games after delivering a 125-117 home win over the San Antonio Spurs on Thursday. Lillard had 26 points and 10 assists and has scored at least 20 points in 17 consecutive games.
TIME: 9 p.m. ET. TV: ESPN, NBCS Northwest, AT&T SportsNet Rocky Mountain, Sportsnet One
ABOUT THE TRAIL BLAZERS (24-28): Backup guard Gary Trent Jr. was one of the stars in the win over San Antonio as he matched his career best of six 3-pointers (missing just once) while scoring 18 points in 24 minutes. "My teammates got me going," Trent said in a postgame television interview. "I got open looks. My job is to knock them down and help this team win to the best of my ability." Lillard has averaged just 23.5 points over the past two games after a lava-like stretch in which he averaged 48.8 over six games.
ABOUT THE JAZZ (32-18): The troublesome stretch comes after Utah won 19 of 21 games and coach Quin Snyder is putting on a brave face despite the adversity. "We haven't played well, we've played sporadically and we're not as good so we have to find that again," Snyder said after the loss to Denver. "There's no easy answers. When you have adversity on the scoreboard and in the form of losses, that's when your look in the mirror." Point guard Mike Conley has scored 20 or more points in back-to-back games for the second time this season - he had 22 points against Portland and 21 versus the Nuggets.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. The teams have split this season's first two meetings but the Trail Blazers have won three of the past four.
2. Mitchell has connected on just 20-of-57 field-goal attempts over the past three games.
3. Portland C Hassan Whiteside matched his season best of 23 rebounds against the Spurs while also contributing 17 points and four blocked shots.