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CLEVELAND — Donovan Mitchell froze a defender with a crossover as he slid into the 3-point line. He dribbled in, and with a quick fake ball and a sidestep, he was around the rim guard and put the ball off the glass for a layup.
It was the kind of movement jazz fans had seen in five seasons, but their team stood on the other side Monday.
Playing his former team for the first time, Mitchell scored 23 points on 8-of-12 shooting – all in just 23 minutes. Why the low minutes? Well, that’s all Cleveland needed from him.
The Cavs made it easy with visiting the Jazz and smashed Utah 122-99 at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse.
Mitchell made the stage with 11 points in the first six minutes of the contest. As he walked out, he nodded his head with a grin. He said after the game that the competition was nothing personal and he consistently downplayed the importance of seeing his former team. At that moment it was hard to believe him.
Regardless, that run set the tone for a long night out for jazz, as Mitchell was far from the only one cooking.
Cleveland shot 61% from field and 58% from 3-point range. As for Utah, it was 40% from the field and 30% from the 3-point line. Just a small difference.
So what happened?
In many ways, it was a repeat of Saturday’s jazz performance in Milwaukee. The Jazz bumped into a physical defense and then withered.
“They’re just big and physical. I don’t think we had the approach we needed to do the little things on offense,” said head coach Will Hardy. “Things as simple as fighting for your seat when you want to make a catch, sprinting to the screen, bending your knees when you put up a screen so you can actually make contact and open up your teammates.
“Teams that are that big and physically strong show that when you don’t. We can’t just use all our speed against them.”
The Jazz don’t have a player who can break down a defense and build everything on their own. In short, they don’t have Mitchell anymore. Distance was poor for much of the night – the absence of Kelly Olynyk, who was out with a sprained ankle – also contributed to this, and the shooting was worse. This is not a good combination for success.
And without an outstanding first half from Lauri Markkanen, things would have been far worse.
Markkanen was fantastic early on in his return to Cleveland. In the first half, he scored 22 points on 6-of-8 shooting. Outside of him, however, it was an unforgettable night on the shores of Lake Erie.
“I think those last two games showed us that when teams have a significant size advantage, we really have to look at the little things to help each other get good shots,” Hardy said.
On a lighter note, the performance helped reveal some of Hardy’s sense of humor. After the game, Hardy was asked how he felt about his defense. He paused for a moment, giving a blank stare before saying, “Objection cited by witnesses.”
He smiled and then said what everyone already knew: “It was awful.”
“I mean, they got where they wanted to go,” he continued. “They took a lot of hard hits, but they also had 10 or 11 dunks.”
The Cavs had 29 fast break points and shot 66% in the paint to shoot 15 of 26 from the 3-point line. With those numbers, Hardy might well have a sense of humor.
Perhaps the Jazz can also blame Mitchell for their performance. After all, the former jazz guard has tried to impose some skill on his old teammates ahead of the game.
“I was trying to get her to play Xbox this morning to distract her because we’re still in the same group chat,” he said after the game.
It didn’t sound like this caper had been all that successful. However, his game more than made up for it.
When asked how he thought Mitchell played tonight, Jordan Clarkson glanced at the stat sheet.
“I don’t know,” Clarkson said almost sarcastically as he searched for Mitchell’s name. “He played well, 8v12, 4v5. He didn’t play much in the fourth quarter; they were up 20. So he played pretty well.”
He looked up and chuckled slightly when he finished answering – just as he probably would have smiled after Mitchell had played such a game for Jazz.
This time, however, he was against Mitchell, and the Jazz had no answer.
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Ryan Miller has covered the Utah Jazz for KSL.com since 2018.