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Jazz defeat Rockets to seize 2-0 edge

Deron Williams scored 22 points and the Utah Jazz defeated Houston 90-84 on Monday to seize a 2-0 lead in their National Basketball Association (NBA) first-round playoff series.

Turkey’s Mehmet Okur added 16 points and 16 points for the Jazz, who also had 13 points from Carlos Boozer in the triumph.

The Jazz, who had the NBA’s best home-court record at 37-4, took a pair of road victories and return home for games tomorrow and Saturday with a chance to sweep the Rockets out of the playoffs.

“We didn’t want to come in and just split. We wanted to come in here and take two,” Williams said. “We did a great job of following our game plan.”

That strategy involved shutting down Houston playmaker Tracy McGrady and it worked well in the fourth quarter, when he went 0-for-3 from the field and scored only one point, his lone point in the last period of either loss.

“We wanted to shut down McGrady. We’re trying to keep fresh bodies on him the whole game, make him settle for jumpers and not take easy shots,” Williams said.

McGrady scored a game-high 23 points and contributed 13 rebounds and nine assists but had no impact when it mattered most, admitting after the game that he was weary after being pushed by the Jazz all night.

He also said that being winless going to Utah will challenge his team’s heart.

“It’s so tough to win up there. It’s going to show what type of team we are,” McGrady said. “We’re either going to fold going up there 0-2 or we’re going to fight back. It’s really going to test our character.”

Rockets coach Rick Adelman expects his team to pass that test.

“Those guys in the locker room played their butts off. I can’t ask for more of an effort than they gave and we came up short,” Adelman said. “We lost the first two games. I don’t dwell on it. We got better in this game. We’ve got to get better in the next game.”
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