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Show Jazz Facing Uphill Battle By John Yardley Just a year after surprising the rest of the NBA and going to the Western Division semi-finals, the Utah Jazz are finding themselves in familiar territory. Mired deep in the second division at 21-26, the Utah entry in the NBA needs to get going and going fast, Until last season, the Jazz were quite adapted to playing in the lower echelons of the National Basketball Association. But if the last few games are an indicator of things to come, the Jazz may make it yet into the playoffs. Coming off a couple of "gutsy" wins, the Jazz head into the final week before the all-star break, just ' eight games back of league leading Denver. Houston, Dallas and San Antonio are spread between the Nuggets and Utah. A couple of things will have to happen if the Jazz are to reach the "legitimate" level of play that they attained last season. First, the A.D. holdout as previously discussed here, must be forgotten. One senses there is still friction between head coach Frank Layden and the All-Star Dantley. A.D. did not even play in the Jazz 121-109 win over Dallas on Friday, but scored 20 in the nail-biting victory over San Antonio 105-104 on Saturday. The Superstar of the Jazz has never consistently performed yet this season as he did last year. A second consideration must be Ricky Green. Green was playing All-Star caliber basketball last season, but has also shown signs of inconsistency this year. With rookie John Stockton to back him up and rest him, Green should be as good as ever. On the more positive side, Mark Eaton had 19 points, a career high, and 12 rebounds in Saturday's win over the Spurs. Eaton progressively improves, and should he have the second half he is capable of, the team would have a great shot at the playoffs, Darrell Griffith and Thurl Bailey are both playing very good basketball of late and Jeff Wilkins has continued well off the bench. On a final aspect of the positive, most Utahns were happy about the Jazz picking up former BYU standout Fred Roberts and the former Ute Pace Mannion. Roberts has seen a fair amount of playing time, coming off the bench at small forward. Mannion has not played as much and, as yet, has been unable to really get in the "groove". As for the statistical side of the Jazz, here is a look through the end of January. As a team the Jazz have four players in double figures in scoring: Dantley at 27.5, Griffith at 22.6, Greer at 13.7, and Bailey checking in at 12.8. Eaton leads the league in blocked shots with 242 for a 5.38 average, about twice as many blocks as the runner-up, Tree Rollins of Atlanta at 2.53. Green rates in the top ten in the league in assists with an 8.0 average and Griffith has hit nearly 60 three-pointers to be tops in that category. Eaton qualifies in the top ten in rebounding with an 11.0 average and Bailey is among the top free-throw shooters with an .879 percentage. As one can easily determine from the above-quoted '"stats", the Jazz are plenty capable of winning ball games. The old question of chemistry and hard work are the two components which, in all likelihood, will be the determining factors. If the Jazz can jell under Layden in the second half of '85 like they did under pressure in '84, they certainly have the potential to finish among the leaders in the Midwest division of the Western Conference. There will be a few "gimme's". The Jazz will have to put it all together and play solid basketball. And although the road is a little uphill, in this writer's opinion, the Utah franchise could very well see playoff action again in 1985. |