At 11-1, Jazz have shown a lot of heart

With plenty of leftovers, and dirty dishes, still stacked up from Thursday, there are a multiple options for pondering the Jazz's half-stuffed turkey of a Thanksgiving Eve win over Sacramento.

One is to look at it as half-full, with plenty to savor heading into tonight's evening-after faceoff with Kobe Bryant and the 8-3 Los Angeles Lakers.

Sacramento coach Eric Musselman, for one, chose that option on behalf of the Jazz even after the Kings blew a 20-plus-point lead — Utah was down by as many as 21 in the third quarter before rallying in the fourth — for the first time in more than three years.

"They are a great team," Musselman said of the 11-1 Jazz, who with seven straight wins in the past two weeks are off to the NBA's best start this season. "Down 21 (and) to fight back on the road and win shows a lot about the character of a team."

At least a couple Jazz players seemed to agree with Musselman, though even they had mixed reviews after having to overcome second-half deficits of 16-plus points for the third time in as many outings.

"We show good heart, we show good fight," forward Matt Harpring said. "And we surely didn't give up. That's a great sign for us.

"This is the NBA, and you always have a chance to come back," Harpring added. "But, I mean, we'd be beating teams by 20 if we didn't do that — not 'just beating' teams."

Guard Derek Fisher felt similarly, suggesting comebacks against Phoenix, Toronto and now Sacramento reveal not only the Jazz's best attributes but also some obvious blemishes.

"This says a lot about us," Fisher said. "There are a lot of situations where it's really easy to — not really 'quit,' but — to get to a point where you don't think you can win it. So you ... start going through the motions. But the guys out there (Wednesday night) believed we could still win this game."

In the next breath, Fisher added, "We were fortunate all three games.

"We deserve a lot of credit," he said, "but you have to think that our opponent has done something wrong at some point."

Or maybe it's that the Jazz are doing something wrong by digging such huge holes.

"We have to get a little bit tougher mentally to start the game, and start (second) halves," Fisher said. "You know, those are crucial points in the game — so, we've got to get better at that."