“Poetic Justice”: Mitchell and Gobert tie off a streak with a lob

SALT LAKE CITY — With their season likely on the line, franchise cornerstones Utah Jazz — who have one of the most scrutinized partnerships in the NBA — have connected.

The result: an alley-oop from Donovan Mitchell to Rudy Gobert that allowed the Jazz to even the series in Game 4 on Saturday. It was the sweetest moment yet in the All-Stars’ sometimes tense five-season tenure as teammates.

“It’s sort of poetic justice,” Gobert told ESPN after Utah’s 100-99 win over the Dallas Mavericks. “It’s a play we’ve made many times. It just happened to be the winning play tonight.”

Much of the jazz discussion in recent years has focused on the dynamic between Gobert and Mitchell. It started when they were the first two NBA players to test positive for COVID-19 early in the pandemic, after which Mitchell accused Gobert of infecting him. They didn’t speak for months until the Jazz began training for the bubble.

Mitchell’s move to Gobert, or lack thereof, and the big man’s displeasure over it had created friction between them prior to this point. Mitchell’s scarcity of passes to Gobert — just 2.7 passes per game this season, according to Second Spectrum data — became a focal point of the team’s media coverage as the Jazz struggled late in the season. the regular season.

So the leaping chest bump Gobert and Mitchell exchanged on the half court after the go-ahead dunk was more than a celebration of that play, which was Mitchell’s first draw or assist to Gobert in the final minute of one of their 345 games. played together, according to ESPN Stats & Information research.

It was a cathartic moment.

“Metaphorical on some level,” Jazz coach Quin Snyder said. “It feels good. I’m not going to lie to you.”

Mitchell also recognized the coin’s symbolism.

“It feels good, because it’s like, man, you hear it,” Mitchell said. “I don’t think him and I sitting here think there’s anything, but we hear it. It’s good to see that and to be able to go out there and do it on a stage like that one, but ultimately those same pieces that we’ve been doing throughout the entire game.

“We trust each other, we feel each other and we’re constantly there to make good plays. It was good. It’s good to trust each other, that’s all.”

As Gobert layly put it in his post-game interview on TNT, “Dude, f— the conversation.”

Gobert wasn’t just referring to discussing his dynamic with Mitchell. He’s also heard that this chapter in jazz history may soon be coming to an end, as there have been persistent rumors of Mitchell potentially requesting a trade this summer, Snyder as a contender for other top jobs. ‘head coach and the Jazz potentially shopping Gobert on the trade market.

“I mean, there’s a lot of noise,” said Gobert, who had 17 points and 15 rebounds in the win. “A lot of people talk about our team, our guys, the future, what can happen, what might not happen, a lot of different things that ultimately don’t matter. importance to us right now. We have a team, we’re 2-2 in the series, and that’s our goal.”

Mitchell finished with 23 points on 7-of-21 shooting, his series-lowest outing, and scored no points in the second half until he hit a free throw with 7:24 left. But he held on as the Jazz came back from a four-point deficit in the final 39.6 seconds.

Mitchell followed his own failure with a -1 drop to bring Utah back to one point with 31.2 seconds left. After Mavs center Dwight Powell missed a pair of free throws, Mitchell and Gobert performed a midfield pick-and-roll. When Powell moved on to Mitchell, putting Dallas defensive scorer Dorian Finney-Smith in the difficult position of trying to defend Gobert from behind as the big man rolled on the paint, Mitchell made the right read and delivered the lob. .

It was his seventh assist of the match and the first for Gobert.

“My teammates and my coaches trust me,” said Mitchell, who shot just 33 percent and had a 19-12 assist-to-rotation ratio in clutch situations this season. “It hasn’t been the best regular season as far as critical time goes for me, but I’m not going to sit here and let that affect how we keep going through the playoffs. The ball goes be in my hands, and I have to play the right game.”

The good play with match 4 and much more in play turned out to be a pass to Gobert. The Jazz couldn’t have written a better script.

“Talking is talking. At the end of the day, these guys respect each other, man,” Jazz Minority owner Dwyane Wade, the NBA legend Mitchell considers a mentor, told ESPN. “I love how we trust each other as a team over time.

“Rudy making those big plays coming from Don was obviously big, but a lot of [the discussion about their relationship] was the outside noise, too. It’s just good to see them performing like that and having the two star players on our team trusting each other in that space like that.”