“Jazz’s Will Hardy leads the way on ‘Chippy, Gritty’ Win vs. Pistons.”

The Utah Jazz took care of things in a wild road matchup against the Detroit Pistons (119-126) on Thursday night – a game with high-flying dunks, a near-second-half comeback by Detroit and even a pair of ejections between Jordan Clarkson and Ron Holland, after the two met in the third quarter.

After the game, coach Will Hardy shared some of his thoughts on the Jazz’s performance and what he saw from a tough and gritty Detroit team.

“I think the game was really, really good for our team,” Hardy said. “A lot of things were obvious in that game, right? It was super physical, heated, ugly, nasty. I really haven’t seen it this year. And Detroit is an incredibly hard-playing team, and I think they test your emotional stability. Will you just fall apart?

The Jazz’s winning streak was led by a strong three-man trio in the starting lineup – Collin Sexton, Lauri Markkanen and Keyonte George. Everyone had 27 or more points on the night, while Markkanen also emerged as a beast, grabbing a game-high 14 rebounds on the night.

Utah took a lot of control in the first quarter as they took a 48-19 lead, but the Pistons wouldn’t give up quietly. In the end, the Jazz’s lead narrowed to single digits thanks to an impressive performance from 2021 first overall pick Cade Cunningham, who scored a game-high 33 points to go along with four rebounds and seven assists.

“I think the best thing about this game was that there were emotional moments for our group that come with the terrain of a game like this, but it didn’t break us,” Hardy continued. We were together in those moments… We had a lot of guys making a lot of big plays, but playing in an environment like that shows our team that there are a lot of different ways to win. There are many different types of games to participate in. We haven’t seen a game like this all year. I don’t know if I’ve seen a game like this in five years.

The Jazz will look to preserve their first two-game winning streak of the regular season with their next road game on Saturday when they travel to New York to take on the 11-16 Brooklyn Nets.

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