Previewing What Lies Ahead for the Utah Jazz
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The Western Conference is a tight playoff race with only two games separating the No. 6-12 seeds. Every win or loss can shift a team one or two spots in the standings.
The Utah Jazz currently sit at the No. 10 spot, right ahead of the Los Angeles Lakers. The Jazz have shown a competitive fire in almost every game this season and will surely be fighting till the end.
Whether or not the organization should tank, head coach Will Hardy and his roster have proven that they're too good to lose enough games to compete at the bottom.
The Jazz have 12 games left till the end of the 2022-23 season and some crucial games lie ahead that will decide the fate of the play-in.
Seven of these last 12 games are against plus-.500 opponents, with all those teams being top six seeds in their respective conferences. After that, four of the remaining games are against teams that are aspiring playoff contenders.
If the Jazz can play well enough to steal a couple of games against those .500-plus teams, they should be able to control their fate. Utah's last four games include a home and away against the Lakers and a home game against the Oklahoma City Thunder.
These games could be the most important of the season as each of these teams jockey for position in the play-in. With injuries piling up and Utah's game against the Sacramento Kings coming on Monday night, Lauri Markkanen was added to the list of banged-up starters ruled out of the action.
All this might look too insurmountable for such a young team to achieve. But that has been the story of the 2022-23 Jazz. A team with no expectations that surprises us all night after night.
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