San Antonio Spurs @ Utah Jazz
Wednesday, March 27, 2024 at 9:00 PM ET
Delta Center, Salt Lake City, UT | Game ID: 22301058
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Final
UTA 15 33 31 32 111SAS 29 30 29 30 118
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Vassell scores 31 and Wembanyama has 19 points and 5 blocks to lead Spurs past Jazz 118-111
SALT LAKE CITY -- — Devin Vassell scored 31 points, Victor Wembanyama had 19 points and five blocks and the San Antonio Spurs ran past the Utah Jazz 118-111 on Wednesday night.
“He’s becoming a real problem for defenses," Wembanyama said of Vassell. "It’s beautiful to see him evolve like this throughout the year.”
The Spurs, second in the league in assists behind Indiana, had a season-high 40 on 44 field goals. San Antonio also shot 51.8% from the field and were well above .500 from 3-point range until missing their final four attempts and finishing 16 of 33.
“That’s Spurs basketball … and Pop preaches it all the time," Vassell said of coach Gregg Popovich. "We were knocking down shots today and everybody was sharing it.”
Jeremy Sochan , Julian Champagnie and Malaki Branham all scored 17 points for San Antonio. But it was Vassell who was the catalyst.
“Get downhill, get to my spots, pick them apart. If they’re trapping me, I can hit the short roll or skip or whatever the pass is, and they’ve been knocking down shots,” said Vassell, who had his sixth 30-point game of the season along with six assists.
Popovich was just as happy about Vassell’s defense.
“He was a monster at both ends for us,” Popovich said.
Collin Sexton had 26 points and nine assists, while Lauri Markkanen scored 25 points for the Jazz, who lost their seventh in a row.
The Jazz led just once and trailed by double-digits most of the game.
“I feel like we were a step slow on everything. We weren’t physical enough on offense or defense,” said Markkanen, who played the entire second half. “Once you make a mistake, they can punish you. Every mistake just adds up, so that’s how they get on a run.”
Utah got as close as 115-111 with 23.2 seconds remaining before Tre Jones sealed the win for San Antonio with two free throws and Wembanyama swatted Utah’s next attempt.
“It was a bad choice,” Wembanyama said about Taylor Hendricks trying to dunk on him at the end of the game.
The Spurs are playing some of their best basketball of the season, beating Phoenix 104-102 on Monday without Wembanyama and running their offense at its most efficient against the Jazz.
“Just goes to show you, we’re getting better each day,” Vassell said. “Obviously, we don’t have that many games left but for us to show improvement especially like this is great. Since the All-Star break, we’ve been an almost totally different team.”
Meanwhile, the Jazz (29-44) have the worst record in the league since the All-Star break, when they traded away three rotation regulars. Utah used 12 players in the first quarter, the most this season.
“Just not enough intensity, physicality, and focus to start the game and we dig ourselves a big hole," Utah coach Will Hardy said. “We had nine turnovers in the first quarter. It’s a combination of sloppiness and some stubbornness at times.”
San Antonio and Wembanyama dominated early, leading by as many as 19 in the first half. And one sequence typified the rookie’s impact.
Wembanyama blocked Markkanen’s layup and then used his long stride to glide downcourt for an alley-oop dunk on the other end. That gave San Antonio a 38-20 lead.
Capped by Markkanen’s 3-pointer, the Jazz used a 17-3 run to get within four points, but the Spurs still led 59-48 at the half.
Who is who
the initials in the Players column
SASBW B. Wesley
CO C. Osman
DB D. Barlow
DV D. Vassell
JC J. Champagnie
JS J. Sochan
MB M. Branham
TJ T. Jones
VW V. Wembanyama
ZC Z. Collins
UTABS B. Sensabaugh
CS C. Sexton
JC J. Collins
KG K. George
KL K. Lewis Jr.
LM L. Markkanen
LS L. Samanic
MP M. Potter
OY O. Yurtseven
TH T. Hendricks
TH T. Horton-Tucker
WK W. Kessler
SAS/UTA the team itself, not a player
-- the feed named nobody
What
What happened
the codes in the Events column
M2 / M3 made 2 / made 3
X2 / X3 missed 2 / missed 3
FT / X1 free throw made / missed
AST assist
OR / DR offensive / defensive rebound
STL steal
BLK block
TO turnover
FL foul
OF offensive foul — ends the possession
VIOL violation
JUMP jump ball
TM timeout
IR instant replay
HE heave at the buzzer, filed to the team
Where
Where a shot came from
the middle field of M3.LW.25
RM at the rim inside 4 ft
RC right corner
RW right wing
SO straight on
LW left wing
LC left corner
M3.LW.25 made 3, left wing, 25 ft
X2.RM.01 missed 2, at the rim, 1 ft
When
When it happened
the Offset column
one number per event, in the Events order:
whole seconds from the start of the
possession to that event
Events FL X3.RC.23 OR M2.RM.01
Offset 0 18 22 24
the foul opens the possession at 0s;
the putback ends it at 24s, which is
the possession's own Dur