This time, Jazz hold on

On Monday night, the Utah Jazz let a game slip away in the final seconds, allowing Vince Carter to drive untouched to the basket for a slam to cut a three-point Jazz lead to one and then seeing him hit a long 3-pointer with a tick left as the New Jersey Nets beat them by one.

Wednesday night, the Jazz managed to hold onto that three-point lead over the final 12 seconds and even add a free throw to it as they rode eight points in the last minute from Mehmet Okur and a free throw and a bear-hugged rebound by Matt Harpring to a 97-93 victory over the San Antonio Spurs in another frantic EnergySolutions Arena basketball game.

"As long as you come out on the winning side, it's OK," said Harpring about another heart-stopper that finally went the Jazz's way after they had lost four games this season when an opponent's shot was in the air at the final buzzer.

"We learned from our mistakes," Jazz rookie Paul Millsap said. "It took us four or five games to learn, but we did. We executed tonight. We did what coach wanted us to do out there and came up with a win."

"I thought tonight they did a little bit better job of trying to guard people and helping people and helping their teammates," said Jazz coach Jerry Sloan, back on the bench after missing Monday's game and Tuesday's practice with a stomach virus that had him still looking pale.

Before the game he'd told his team — again missing leading scorer and rebounder Carlos Boozer, who will be out for at least a month with a hairline fracture of the left fibula near the knee — that he didn't so much need more offense to make up for Boozer's absence. "I need more defense than I do offense, because we're going to score the ball if we execute our offense," Sloan said.

And he got strong defense from Okur, Millsap, Rafael Araujo and Jarron Collins, at times each playing one of the NBA's greatest, Tim Duncan, who scored 25 with the two late baskets but had to work for his points.

"They're a difficult team to play against, but a lot of guys played well," Sloan said.

Utah moved its record to 30-17 but has another difficult exam Saturday night against the Phoenix Suns (36-9).

San Antonio, in the second game of its annual long road trip with a rodeo occupying AT&T Center, fell to 32-15 . The Spurs have never been worse than 5-2 in the five years of their rodeo roadie. They won at Los Angeles 96-94 Sunday.