Jazz almost desperate for win

They have lost three straight games, five of their last six, seven of their last nine — and have not looked especially encouraging along the way. They have not yet played a February game, but still the notion of postseason participation seems to be fleeting.

Sound familiar?

It should.

The Jazz have been down this road.

They took it just last season, when January 2005 featured the conclusion of a nine-game losing streak followed by a stretch in which Utah lost seven of nine.

Still, Jazz captain Matt Harpring insists not all hope is lost.

Not now. Not like last February.

"We're far from that," Harpring said.

"It's a different feeling," he added. "I can honestly say last year at this time — I mean, you never say you're 'out of the playoffs,' but it was harder to see it (then) than this year. I mean, I still feel like we can make the playoffs this year. In fact, I know we can."

As it stands, the 21-24 Jazz are on the outside of the NBA postseason picture looking in. They are ninth in the Western Conference, and only eight advance. Eighth-place Minnesota has a couple fewer losses in a couple fewer games, and 10th-place Golden State lurks close behind.

Still, Harpring holds on to that hopin' feeling.

"We're still in the playoff hunt," he said Tuesday, as the Jazz prepared for tonight's Delta Center meeting with a Denver team — the same Nuggets, plus back-from-a-broken-pinkie starting center Marcus Camby — that beat Utah by 30 just last Jan. 20 at the Pepsi Center.

"I hope that we haven't written off the fact that we're (contending for) the playoffs, because we can be a good team. We can be in the playoffs. . . . I mean, we're right there. We've proven this year we can play well. Shoot, we won eight out of nine."

That was from late in December through almost mid-January.

Then Dwayne Wade, Shaquille O'Neal and the Miami Heat beat Utah at the Delta Center, and it's been a more down than up ride since.

There have been victories over Toronto and New Jersey, but losses as well to the Los Angeles Clippers, Cleveland, Seattle, Dallas and San Antonio — plus the one that may really have compounded matters, the 113-83 whoopin' at the hands of the Nuggets.

"Denver came at us very strong to start the game," Jazz coach Jerry Sloan said Tuesday. "They pushed us around, and they pushed us all over the floor, and we didn't hang in there to try to fight back.

"We became very soft, not only physically but mentally as well," he added. "There's probably a little fallout from that."

The Jazz really haven't been right since, and it all came to a head in Monday's loss to the Spurs.