The San Antonio Spurs are running out of time to get back in the postseason picture and need to take advantage of their home-game opportunities, including their contest against the surging Utah Jazz on Friday.
The game will be the second since San Antonio coach Gregg Popovich tied Don Nelson at 1,335 for the most career regular-season wins by an NBA coach. It’s also the third of a season-high-tying seven-game homestand for the Spurs.
San Antonio lost to Toronto 119-104 at home on Wednesday to drop its fifth game in its past six outings.
“(Toronto) did a great job on the boards, and we turned it over too much — 22 points off turnovers,” Popovich said after the loss. “They were tough to stop. Their one-on-one was pretty good, and our defense was average in that regard. They deserve the game, but I thought we played hard and did some good things.”
The Spurs’ Keldon Johnson led all scorers with 27 points while Dejounte Murray racked up 25 points and 12 assists, Lonnie Walker IV added 13 points and Jakob Poeltl had 11 points and 12 rebounds in the loss.
“We missed some easy shots, some wide-open 3s, and things like that,” Johnson said. “Obviously, it’s hard to win when you’re missing wide-open shots. We fought, we are going to adjust and we are going to get back to it on Friday.”
Despite the setback San Antonio stayed in 12th place in the Western Conference and two spots out of the play-in game. The Spurs are two games behind New Orleans in the standings with 16 games to play, entering Thursday.
The Jazz head to San Antonio on the heels of a dominating 123-85 home win over Portland on Wednesday. Utah got 27 points from Bojan Bogdanovic, 16 from Donovan Mitchell and 11 from Royce O’Neale in the victory, which was its eighth in a row at home.
Utah was up 63-35 at halftime and expanded its lead to 96-49 after allowing the Trail Blazers just 14 points in the third quarter. Despite being outscored by nine in the final period, the Jazz finished with their largest margin of victory since beating Sacramento 154-105 last season.
“Some of the things we’ve talked about, no matter the score, no matter the opponent are the things that we need to do to play,” Utah coach Quin Snyder said after the blowout. “Regardless of who the opponent is, sometimes that’s more difficult because they’re doing something different.
“I didn’t think that happened. I felt like we continued to play the right way on both ends. I liked how we moved the ball — thought we defended.”
Utah’s starters were able to rest the entire fourth quarter and none played more than 24 minutes.
The Jazz are in fourth place in the West, two and a half games back of Golden State and a game and a half ahead of Dallas in the standings, entering Thursday.
The teams have split their two games this season, with both winning on their opponent’s floor.
