Rookie Jarron Collins scored a career-high 22 points and Russian rookie Andrei Kirilenko added 13 as the Jazz pulled away in the second half for a 95-80 victory over the Seattle SuperSonics.
Last season, Utah lost to the upstart Dallas Mavericks in the Western Conference quarterfinals. The defeat was its earliest postseason exit since 1995.
In the offseason, much was made of aging Karl Malone and John Stockton. The future Hall-of-Fame duo carried the team through the first two months as Utah was under .500 and still leads the team most nights.
 Bryon Russell's limbs go every which way on this shot attempt. Kent Horner NBAE/Getty Images |
Collins entered Wednesday's game averaging just 4.2 points and 3.1 rebounds. But he had shown signs of life recently with 10 points and seven rebounds against Denver on Monday and 13 points against Phoenix on January 8.
Matched up against journeyman Art Long, Collins made 9-of-9 shots and grabbed 10 rebounds. He scored 13 points in the second half, which the Jazz dominated.
"He just seems to get better and better," Utah coach Jerry Sloan said. "He just keeps working, works hard in practice. What a wonderful transformation from when he was here this summer. He changed his whole body around.
"I'm just happy he's had a chance to gradually get better. We give some minutes because he acts like he wants to play. He's not bored by playing and stays involved. He tries to play the game intelligently and he's had success because of it."
The 6-11 swingman from Stanford has supplanted incumbent center Greg Ostertag and has also taken minutes away from free agent pickup John Amaechi.
Sloan inserted him in the starting lineup November 28, when the Jazz were 6-9. Since then, Utah is 16-8.
On Wednesday, Collins played 31 minutes, while Ostertag and Amaechi were held scoreless in 14 combined minutes.
"There's a lot of opportunities to go out there and just produce for my teammates," Collins said. "Tonight I got it going offensively a little bit, my shot was falling and I was just staying really aggressive.
"It's been a while going back to the pick-up games and summer league. It's been a while since I put up high offensive numbers, but the most important thing is that the team won."
Amaechi signed a multi-year contract after averaging 9.1 points over the last two seasons with Orlando and was expected to help Malone in the post.
But that has not happened. Amaechi is averaging 3.0 points and 11.5 minutes in 28 games and has not played in three of Utah's last six games.
What makes it more impressive is Collins was the 53rd pick in the draft and did not have a guaranteed contract. That has impressed his coach and has earned the praise of his teammates.
"We knocked down open shots and Jarron over there, who everybody is talking about, had a terrific game," Stockton said. "Every time we stagnated a little bit, he was able to make a play, he played very well.
"I certainly didn't feel he couldn't put up those kind of numbers, but nobody expected it. He a young fella and he works very hard every day. It's exciting to see him succeed like that."
He has earned it with his play on both sides of the court. On Wednesday, he helped limit Seattle's starting frontcourt to 24 points. Two nights earlier, he held Raef LaFrentz to 10 points.
"He's shown he can shoot the ball a little," Sloan said. "Those things keep adding to your repertoire. He had to come in and try to do it from a defensive standpoint. Ninety-nine percent of the players in this league try to show you how they can make it through their offense.
"I think it's interesting, how he's tried to make it by just being able to defend people. By doing that he has gotten better defensively, but has also gotten better offensively."
The game was tied 39-39 at halftime as the Jazz shot just 39.5 percent (15-of-38). Utah took control of the game with a 16-4 run, opening a 55-43 lead on Stockton's jumper with 7:16 left.
Seattle responded with a 10-2 run to get within 57-53 but could never get over the hump due to its inability to stop Collins. The rookie easily made an eight-foot jumper that helped the Jazz outscore the Sonics 13-7 for the remainder of the period.
The Jazz led 70-60 after three periods and scored 11 straight points in a span of 3:32 to make it 85-64 with 6:15 remaining.
Gary Payton scored 21 points for the Seattle, which shot less than 41 percent (29-of-71) en route to their third lopsided loss of the season to the Jazz.
With the two teams sporting similar records, the Sonics have lost the three games this season by an average of 18.6 points.
The Sonics have lost the last eight here since a 104-96 win on February 1, 2000. Their average point differential has been 13.6.
After the game Payton, who shot 9-of-14, had no answers for the streak.
"They just beat us," he said. "I mean we don't play well against them. So this is just one of those teams where we don't play well against.
"We only play about two or three quarters, so we've got to find a solution the last game we play them. We didn't play defense, didn't execute. They built a 10-point lead and especially here, you can't catch up to that."