Jazz at Pelicans
The Utah Jazz have seen their season-worst losing streak reach five
games and aim to salvage the finale of a four-game road trip when they
visit the New Orleans Pelicans on Saturday. Utah has lost eight of its
last 10 games after dropping a 94-88 decision to the Memphis Grizzlies
on Friday to slip two games behind the eighth-place Houston Rockets for
the final Western Conference playoff spot.
The loss to Memphis was painful for the Jazz, who scored 11 points in the second quarter and 16 in the fourth quarter to help the Grizzlies rally. "Our guys are hurting," Jazz coach Quin Snyder told reporters. "We have a game (Saturday) night. This is the toughest part of the year from a scheduling standpoint for us. We're on a road trip and hopefully we can bounce back and get a win in New Orleans." The Pelicans have lost three consecutive games and let a fourth-quarter lead get away in each - versus Minnesota and Houston before San Antonio on Thursday. "Three quarters we're just beating the team. I mean, it just boils down to the last three minutes," shooting guard Eric Gordon told reporters. "We get stagnant and we're not really scoring the ball. We just got to fix that. Once we fix that, we'll run off a lot of wins."
TV: 7 p.m. ET, ROOT (Utah), FSN New Orleans
ABOUT THE JAZZ (28-33): Small forward Gordon Hayward is befuddled over how Utah can play superbly over one stretch of the game and extremely dismal over another portion. "It's hard to talk about over and over," Hayward told reporters. "It's just something we have to figure out or we're going to be looking at going home early. So we have to figure this out." Hayward scored 18 points against the Grizzlies to fall just shy of a 20-point outing - he had eight in the previous 11 games.
ABOUT THE PELICANS (23-37): All-Star power forward Anthony Davis has been badgered by opponents since his epic 59-point, 20-rebound effort against the Detroit Pistons on Feb. 21. He scored more than 17 points once in his past four games and didn't attempt a shot in the final 3 1/2 minutes in Thursday's loss to the Spurs when New Orleans missed its final six attempts. "When he comes baseline, there’s going to be a double-team situation," Pelicans coach Alvin Gentry told reporters. "As I said earlier when I spoke, in those situations then he's got to become a facilitator. But we've got to try to get him the ball in the post there in those situations, yes."
BUZZER BEATERS
1. The Jazz are 2-4 against the Pelicans during Quin Snyder's two seasons as coach.
2. Utah SG Rodney Hood is averaging 9.8 points on 30.8 percent shooting during the five-game losing streak.
3. New Orleans backup SF Ryan Anderson is averaging 11 points on 8-of-30 shooting over the past two games.