Utah Jazz Notes

With their Sunday morning practice, the Jazz started preparations for Wednesday’s opener at Denver, as coach Jerry Sloan said his primary focus continues to be improved defense.

Sloan described the Jazz’s defense as “awful” in Friday’s preseason finale at Sacramento, even though his team held the Kings to 85 points on 38.8 percent shooting - - numbers that nearly any team would take on a given night.

Sloan explained his comments Sunday by saying the Jazz likely would have lost had Sacramento not missed 17 free throws. “Our defense of helping each other wasn’t as good as it has been in the starts that we’ve had,” Sloan added.

He noted that the pressure is about increase with the start of the regular season, saying, “Once the exhibition season’s over, I think your mind-set changes a little bit . . . .If they have a bad game in the exhibition season, they can forget about it a lot quicker, I think.”

* * *

Wesley Matthews showed off his soccer skills with Mehmet Okur before practice Sunday, juggling a basketball. Matthews was an all-region high school soccer player in Madison, Wis., and set school scoring records.

His father, Wes, claims that his son was an even better soccer than basketball player. Upon seeing Matthews on Sunday, one Jazz staffer joked about not including him in the joint NBA/English Premier League skills exhibition during the team’s trip to London.

--Ross Siler

There are still questions from reporters in almost every city and still speculation about what will happen before the February trade deadline, but four weeks into the season, the Jazz’s dominant storyline of Carlos Boozer’s discontent largely has disappeared.

For that, general manager Kevin O’Connor is grateful, praising the way Boozer has handled himself so far.

“He’s been an absolute total pro, absolute total pro,” O’Connor said Sunday. “He’s done everything that coach has asked him to do. Just been an absolute total professional.”

Boozer averaged 12.5 points and 6.4 rebounds while shooting better than 60 percent in the preseason. O’Connor even said he looks at Boozer as little different from Kyrylo Fesenko and Kyle Korver in playing in a contract year.

O’Connor didn’t dispute the suggestion that the Jazz appear a better team for having brought back Boozer, despite his trade campaign this summer in which he went so far as to name Chicago and Miami as favored destinations.

“He’s made the All-Star team two of the last three years,” O’Connor said. “That’s some of the things that you focus on. Not the negatives, the positives that he brings. He’s a veteran that’s in the prime of his basketball career and somebody that came back in shape. 

“He’s healthy and he’s been an absolute, total professional, working on the things he has said himself he wants to work on to become more of a complete player. We’re thrilled.”

--Ross Siler

Jazz coach Jerry Sloan came away convinced of one thing after watching an overmatched Eric Maynor attempt to slow fellow rookie guard Tyreke Evans in Friday’s game against Sacramento.

“He’s got to get stronger,” Sloan said. “Teams will go right at him right at him every time down the floor if you’re not careful. That’s where he’s got to continue to work, to get in better condition and more strength, because this is a tough business.”

At 6-foot-6, 220 pounds, Evans was a handful even for Deron Williams. He struggled with his jumper in going 6-for-13 and 0-for-2 from three-point range, but had little trouble getting to the basket against the slight Maynor.

It has been striking this preseason to see just how small Maynor is compared with some of his counterparts around the league. He’s officially 6-foot-3, 175 pounds, but Maynor called himself 170 and said he played at 165 all four years at Virigina Commonwealth.

“My whole life, I ain’t been able to put on weight,” Maynor said. “But you know what? I’m going to do whatever they insist on me doing to gain that weight and if I can put on some pounds during the season, that’d be a plus. It wouldn’t never be a bad thing.”

Maynor went on to joke: “I always say I’m trying to get to 185.” After they drafted him in June, the Jazz noted that Maynor did not have the benefit of a full-scale strength and conditioning program at VCU, which does not have a Division I football team.

“It was just stuff we had to do,” Maynor said of weight training in college.

He finished the preseason on a positive note, with 13 points and two assists against the Kings. That included a pair of three-pointers, leaving Maynor 6-for-12 from long range, even as he went 21-for-58 (36.2 percent) overall.

“I feel comfortable and I’m glad coach put me out there, just to get a taste of how everything goes,” said Maynor, who has been working with part-time assistant coach Jeff Hornacek on his shooting. “Now I’m ready for the regular season.”

--Ross Siler

For all the injuries the Jazz suffered last season, the worst it got lineup-wise was a set of back-to-back games at Charlotte and Cleveland in mid-November. 

Deron Williams was out with his sprained ankle, Mehmet Okur was in Turkey attending to his ailing father and Andrei Kirilenko couldn’t play after suffering a sprained right index finger. 

The Jazz ended up starting Ronnie Price, Ronnie Brewer, C.J. Miles, Carlos Boozer and Kosta Koufos and lost to both the Bobcats and Cavaliers to cap a 1-4 trip.

That said, things are beginning to appear a little desperate for the Jazz as they look ahead to opening night Wednesday at Denver. All they can do is hope that Brewer’s back and Price’s hamstring both are feeling better when they reconvene Sunday for practice.

Otherwise, the Jazz could be down to just nine players in uniform, much as they were for Friday’s preseason finale against Sacramento. That left Deron Williams not only playing 41 minutes but much of it out of position at off guard.

Williams was a good sport about the whole thing, but his comments after the game suggested that the Jazz might have to consider acquiring a veteran somehow.

“Hopefully, Ronnie Price gets back soon,” Williams said. “I don’t know if we’re going to pick anybody else up, but that might be the easiest thing to do.”

Jazz coach Jerry Sloan thought Friday’s game was beneficial for his players, forcing some of them to play out of position, as they might be asked to do during the regular season.

“That’s a good experience for them because you never know, some nights you come to the game and have all those things happen,” Sloan said. “You’ve got two or three guys sick or something and they’ve got to be ready to play.”

If nothing else, it sounds as if Williams will play off guard some to open the season. “We’ll probably do that some, play a smaller lineup, I guess,” Sloan said.

Williams vowed one thing after the game: “I’m going to stop talking about injuries so we don’t have to talk about them any more.”

The Jazz opened the second and fourth quarters with a lineup of Eric Maynor, Williams, Paul Millsap, Koufos and Kyrylo Fesenko. Not surprisingly, the Jazz struggled to score at the outset of both quarters.

They did come alive midway through the second quarter with a 13-0 run that broke open a tie game and put the Jazz ahead for good. As part of the run, Millsap had an acrobatic tip-in, Maynor hit a three-pointer and Millsap threw down a dunk on the break.

That came as a result of a nice defensive sequence when Fesenko and Williams trapped Tyreke Evans and came up with a steal. Millsap had 11 of his 19 points in the quarter and also had seven rebounds for the game.

* * *

Spencer Hawes had one of the worst lines you’ll ever see in Friday’s game: 0-for-6 from the field and 1-for-6 from the foul line in 20 minutes. The Kings went 5-for-19 from three-point range and missed 17 free throws as a team.

--Ross Siler

The Utah Flash just announced that former Stanford All-American and nine-year NBA veteran Mark Madsen has been named an assstant coach.

Madsen replaces Dale Osbourne, who was hired by the Oklahoma City Thunder and took a position with their NBA Developmental League affiliate in Tulsa.

A former first-round draft pick, Madsen spent nine seasons in the NBA with the L.A. Lakers and Minnesota Timberwolves. In 453 regular-season games, he averaged 2.2 points and 2.6 rebounds.

Nicknamed "Mad Dog" for his tenacious style of play, Madsen will assist Flash head coach Brad Jones, who guided Utah to the D-League finals last season.

"I am very excited about joining the Utah Flash organization," Madsen said. “Not only for opportunity to assist coach Jones and the learn the Utah Jazz system, but also to share my knowledge and experience with the players."

Madsen is 33. He played on the Lakers' championship teams in 2001 and 2002.

"We are very excited to have coach Madsen on our staff," said team president Joe Brown.  "He knows what it takes to win at the highest level, and I know that will translate to success with our team and our players."

At Stanford, Madsen helped lead the Cardinal to four NCAA tournaments and one Final Four.

-- Steve Luhm