It’s Not the Same Old Song With Jazz

Hope all you folks in Lakerland are enjoying watching the Utah Jazz play this week.

It’s not as though you have many alternatives, with the rest of the NBA playoff series giving new meaning to the term May sweeps period. Utah-Portland is the only show around.

Perhaps now that Utah doesn’t represent any threat to the Lakers (it turns out the Lakers were their own worst enemy), you can look at the Jazz objectively, appreciate the players for what they do--and what they don’t do.

They don’t commit blunders that make you say, “What was he thinking?” They don’t deny themselves opportunities to win. Most important, unlike certain purple-wearing teams, they don’t voluntarily surrender when the playoff grim reaper comes to the door.

Utah fought off elimination for the third time this postseason by beating the Trail Blazers, 88-71, in Game 5 Tuesday night. Although they remain behind in the series, three games to two heading back to Portland for tonight’s Game 6, Utah made it clear that Portland can’t wrap this up easily. After all, Utah has won six of its last seven elimination games over the last two playoffs. The only loss was to Chicago in Game 6 of the 1998 NBA finals. The Jazz could have called it quits last week while trailing the Sacramento Kings late in Game 4 of the first round. Instead they pulled out a victory on a jumper by John Stockton, then came back to win Game 5 at the Delta Center in overtime.

The Jazz could have yielded to a Portland team that is younger and deeper and has played smothering defense. It decided to come out and play with more passion, more aggression and more intelligence in Game 5, running the offense to perfection.

When Utah’s offense works properly, it’s something to behold, resulting in open shots almost every time down the floor. Stockton always looks as if he knows exactly what he wants to do and gets the ball to the right place at the right time. Karl Malone is such a good passer himself, he makes you want to see him do it more often. Jeff Hornacek is known for his shooting, but he drives into the heart of the lane fearlessly and comes up with some circus shots.

Jazz players even seem less whiny than in the past. Maybe it’s because they’re on the same court as the Trail Blazers, who make anyone look good by comparison. The Trail Blazers constantly have issues with the officiating. In one game early in the series a call went against Portland and all five Trail Blazer players moved in unison--like a school of fish--from one referee to another, complaining all the way.

Now that Michael Jordan is retired, there’s no one who wants to win a championship as desperately as John Stockton.

In retrospect, it’s amazing how deeply committed to winning Jordan was even after he had multiple championship rings. He kept beating teams in the latter years of his career not because he had more talent, but because winning mattered more to him than it did to anyone else.

Stockton is the only player left in the NBA who even approaches Jordan’s level of desire. It’s evident in the way he plays. He gets the edge over Reggie Miller, Patrick Ewing and David Robinson, the other old heads still alive in these playoffs.

Stockton doesn’t make every big shot, but it seems as though he always comes close when it doesn’t go in. And you never hear any other Jazz players complaining that they were open, or that the play wasn’t run correctly. If the ball is in Stockton’s hands, it’s the right play.

That Stockton has played in more playoff games (157) without winning a championship than anyone in NBA history probably has something to do with his competitive fire. The bottom-line results are that Stockton, 37, has outplayed two starting point guards (Sacramento’s Jason Williams and Portland’s Damon Stoudamire) who were in elementary school when Stockton entered the league. In this series, Stockton has 45 assists to Stoudamire’s 20 in roughly the same amount of minutes.

It’s difficult to imagine Stockton, who has played in Utah for 15 seasons, doing anything else besides wearing a Jazz uniform. He’s a free agent after this season, so brace yourself for the possibility, if ever so small. Malone, Hornacek and Shandon Anderson will be free agents too.

This could be it tonight. Even if everyone comes back next season, they’ll also be older and further removed from championship contention. The Trail Blazers and San Antonio Spurs look as though they have passed Utah. And one of these years, the Lakers might even get it together.

If Utah falls short of a championship, the Jazz will go down as just another good team that never did anything special, like the Milwaukee Bucks in the early 1980s or the Trail Blazer teams from the start of this decade. If you’ve watched, if you’ve paid attention, you’ll know better.

J.A. Adande can be reached at his e-mail address: j.a.adande@latimes.com.