After his team grabbed a thrilling 124-117 win over the Oklahoma City Thunder, an opponent that beforehand happened to have the best record in the Western half of the NBA, on Tuesday night, Will Hardy was asked a question that seemed to stump him. It was an innocent question, one that when it reverberated in his ears and caromed around in his expansive basketball brain had the effect of a two-by-four swung straight smack-dab into the middle of his forehead.
Is there anything specific that surprises you about this Jazz team?
Following a long pause, and the scratch of an itch or two, the real smart man, who even at the tender age of 36 has forgotten more about hoops than a lot of educated folks ever knew, responded in the manner most of us would if we were asked to solve the Riemann Hypothesis, mathematics’ most complex, unsolvable problem.
All anyone in the interview room heard was, “Everything.” Or maybe it was, “Nothing.”
That’s what happens when the everything-and-nothing Jazz knock off a visitor that coming in had won 10 more games than they had and lost 11 fewer.
And in the postgame, the Jazz appeared as though they weren’t quite sure exactly what had just taken place. What they knew was that the result, as Lauri Markkanen put it, felt good.
In the locker room, after their showers were finished, veteran guard Kris Dunn and rookie guard Keyonte George and star forward Markkanen, each having played huge roles in the win and each now standing in front of his own locker, discussed one of the game’s pivotal final plays, a play that somehow went cattywampus, but still ended with Markkanen hitting a decisive, devastating jumper from deep.
Hey, victory’s kisses are soft and sweet, regardless of how plump or pencil-thin its lips are.
But to designate what the Jazz achieved against the Thunder as anything other than impressive and earned would be a mistake. Dunn played great defense down the stretch on OKC star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who still totaled 28 points. He might have gone for 40 without Dunn’s efforts.
Hardy labeled Dunn’s defense “magnificent” and “amazing.”