Utah Jazz lose summer league opener to Spurs
The Utah Jazz were happy to get their first summer league game out of the way, even if it ended in a 90-69 loss to the San Antonio Spurs on Monday night at Vivint SmartHome Arena.
With two more games in Salt Lake City and the Las Vegas circuit soon after, the first game was viewed as a warmup.
"Overall, it was good … it was the first time playing together," Jazz summer league head coach Johnnie Bryant said.
Still, the Jazz know they have a lot to clean up going into Tuesday's set of games. Utah will play the Boston Celtics at 5 p.m.; the first game, between San Antonio and Philadelphia, will start at 3 p.m.
"It's good to get the first one out of the way. We obviously didn't play the way we wanted (to)," Jazz guard Marcus Paige said. "We [need to] clean some things up on defense, we have the right personnel to be a lot better."
As the headliner of the roster, second-year forward Trey Lyles did his part. Posting a team-high 13 points and 12 points, Lyles, who finished 3-for-6 from 3-point range, started off hot and scored 11 points in the first quarter to set an example for how the rest of the Jazz players want to produce moving forward.
"It gives him the ability to lead," Bryant said about Lyles' opportunity this week. "He's the quote-unquote 'old guy' — even though he's 20 — leading the younger guys that are actually older than him. He's done great job being vocal, showing he has the ability to lead the group."
In the backcourt, Aaron Craft and Paige shared point guard duties. Craft finished with eight points and two steals, while Paige added seven points. In the frontcourt, Tibor Pleiss had seven points and four rebounds, and rookie Joel Bolomboy of Weber State had two points and five rebounds.
"I was a little nervous going out there, I had a lot of people come out to support me," Bolomboy said. "We have so much more to play and so much more room to grow as a team."
Olivier Hanlan, last year's second-round draft pick from Boston College who spent the past season playing in Lithuania, finished with 11 points, three rebounds and three assists.