In what was probably the ugliest and sloppiest game of the day, Utah held off a late Miami to win 69-59. Miami’s inept free throw shooting (16-32) played a big part in allowing Utah to escape with the win. Utah is back in action tomorrow at 3 PM against the Houston Rockets who also came away triumphant today.
The Positives
- Dionte Christmas: If it weren’t for Dionte Christmas stepping up in the second half Utah probably would have lost this game. He had 14 points on 6-10 shooting and was 2-4 from downtown. The product out of Syracuse also had 5 boards and 3 dimes.
- Assists: Out of 24 made field goals, 66.7% (16) of them were assisted. That’s a pretty high rate.
- Rudy Gobert’s Potential: he didn’t light up the stat sheet (6pts, 3reb, 3blk) but Gobert showed flashes of insane potential today. We knew he was raw, so the fact that he looked bad at times is unsurprising. However, we saw his ridiculous wingspan on multiple occasions which he used to reject a few shots. With proper coaching this kid could become one of the elite rim protectors in the NBA a few years down the road.
- Steals: Utah finished with 10 steals, while Miami only came away with 7. Rasid Mahalbasic, Chris Roberts and Rodney Green all had 2.
- Limited turnovers: Utah only turned it over 13 times compared to Miami who turned it over on 17 occasions. This isn’t near as bad as some other teams today. Orlando had 22 turnovers, Boston had 23, Detroit had 23, Brooklyn had 22, etc.
- Defense: Miami scored fewer points than any other team playing today, so Utah was doing something right on the defensive end.
- Alec Burks: in just under 11 minutes of play, Alec Burks scored 10 points and was dominating early in the action. If he wouldn’t have come out with an ankle injury Utah probably would have won much more easily.
The Negatives
- Offense: even though they came away victorious, Utah looked really bad on offense. They were settling for bad looks and struggled to finish at the rim. They were 24-65 (36.9%) from the floor, that’s bad.
- Three Point Shooting: Utah showed no signs of life of being dangerous from downtown. They were an atrocious 3-12 (25%) from behind the arch. Dionte Christmas (2-4) was their only threat from range once Burks had to come out of the game with an injury.
- Free Throw Shooting: Utah got to the line at a pretty high rate and earned 29 attempts from the charity stripe. They only made 18 (62.1%) of these attempts however. That wasn’t as bad as Miami, but it was still bad and needs to come up.
- Trey Burke: Utah’s star rookie was really underwhelming in his first summer league game. He was only 1-12 from the field and missed all 4 attempts from behind the arch. He was often times trying to make too much happen instead of just letting the game come to him. He still finished with an impressive 7 rebounds.
Key Player Stats
- Dionte Christmas: 14pts, 5reb, 3ast, 6-10 FGM-A, 2-4 3PM-A
- Alec Burks: 10pts, 4-6 FGM-A, 1-2 3PM-A
- Trey Burke: 8pts, 7reb, 5ast, 1-12 FGM-A, 0-4 3PM-A
- James Mays: 8pts, 6reb, 3ast, 3blk, 3-10 FGM-A
- Chris Roberts: 11pts, 4-8 FGM-A
- Rudy Gobert: 6pts, 4reb, 3blk, 2-5 FGM-A
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