Utah Jazz defeated the Brooklyn Nets. Is that a good thing? -Deseret News

BROOKLYN – The Utah Jazz defeated the Brooklyn Nets 105-94 on Saturday night to win two straight games.

In terms of development, morale and chemistry, the wins against the Detroit Pistons on Thursday and then the Nets on Saturday were really good for the Jazz.

They certainly weren’t the best games the Jazz have ever played, and they didn’t look particularly good at times, but finding ways to stick together, endure runs and not back down in tense situations was a real growth opportunity for many of the players.

“As a coach, this makes me very optimistic about our group,” Jazz head coach Will Hardy said, “because even though things were tough in our last two games, the team came together and didn’t fall apart.”

“We talked about that a lot. In the first quarter (Saturday) our defense was good, couldn’t make a shot, couldn’t make a free throw and the team just held on, so we had to win these two road games and fight through a tough offense, which makes me proud as a coach.”

However, from an end goal perspective, these aren’t great wins for the Jazz. The Nets and Pistons could be teams that end up fighting for high lottery spots, and those two wins have given the Jazz the fifth-worst record in the league.

This means that there are four teams with worse records that can achieve better lottery odds. Fifth place in the lottery is good for a 10.5 percent chance of first place.

There are still 55 games left to play, so the season is still young and there is plenty of time for lottery and position jockeying at the end of the season, but these wins against some of the other tanking teams could end up being very important given the wins and Defeats taken into account columns are completed.

Comparing the Nets roster to the Jazz

The Jazz are in such a unique situation as a tanking team in the process of rebuilding because they have so many players that could really be cornerstones for the future, which has its pros and cons.

Having players like Lauri Markkanen, Walker Kessler and a whole group of young players who could develop into more effective players is of course a good starting point when thinking about building a future team, but if that’s with players like Collin Sexton and John Collins, Jordan Clarkson and even plug-and-play guys like Svi Mykhailiuk make the group much smarter, more experienced and more talented than some of the other teams looking to lose most of their games this season.

When you look at the Nets’ roster and think about who they want to keep as part of the backbone going forward, it’s hard to really consider anyone other than Cam Thomas.

I suppose you could make a case for trying to develop a few of the other young players on the team, but there isn’t anyone who really stands out that you can invest time and money into.

It just made me look at things from a fan’s perspective and I can understand both arguments. You want to lose as many games as possible to maximize your chance of getting the number 1 seed. But if there’s no one on the team worth playing alongside that No. 1, then are you really successful in a rebuild?

It just feels like the Jazz (as long as the Jazz don’t win too many games) are in a more favorable position when it comes to actually putting a team together down the road.