The Utah Jazz keep marching along.
Behind a 37-point outburst by Donovan Mitchell, Utah went up 2-0 in the Western Conference Semifinals. Mitchell has now scored at least 35 points in back-to-back games, the first Jazz player to do so since Karl Malone.
“For me it was, I’m going to make my imprint,” Mitchell said of his performance. “That was my mindset. I’m going to be aggressive and pick my spots.”
Despite Mitchell’s dominant night, the game was close, and wasn’t officially decided until under a minute left when he hit a shot and drew a foul from Paul George.
Prior to that, consecutive three-pointers from Clippers Guard Reggie Jackson gave them a 101-99 lead, their first of the night.
“We’re just trying to make sure we can keep them on their heels and not allow them to get into set defenses,” said Jackson. “That’s what I love about life is the law of averages. We were bound to get hot.”
The lead was short lived, and Utah struck back, regaining the lead thanks to a 14-2 run. With 3:07 to go, they led 113-103.
“You can’t dig yourself a hole like that against a good team,” Clippers coach Tyronn Lue said. “Then you’ve got to expend all your energy trying to get back in the game and you don’t have enough to finish.”
The Jazz ultimately won by a final of 117-111.
“We took a punch, but we were able to collect ourselves and obviously got stops late,” said Jazz coach Quin Snyder.
The two teams have a travel day Friday as the series shifts to Los Angeles for Games 3 and 4.
Game 3 gets underway at 8:30 PM Eastern Time and will be airing on ABC as the Jazz try and bump their series lead up to 3-0.
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