Boozer kept in check by Spurs

SAN ANTONIO — An hour before Sunday's Western Conference finals Game 1, Jerry Sloan gave away the Jazz's game plan.

"If (Carlos Boozer) doesn't get to touch the ball," Sloan said, "then, you know, there is not much use to playing him."

Not that that's any big secret.

While media members may have gotten the message, however, the Jazz apparently did not.

Boozer finished with 20 points in Utah's 108-100 loss, but Utah's starting power forward had just four points on 1-of-6 shooting from the field in the second half.

"My first half was terrible," said Boozer, who was troubled with three opening-half fouls. "They did a great job taking me out a little bit."

How?

It's pretty simple, actually.

"They just played him," Jazz coach Jerry Sloan said of Boozer, who was guarded early by San Antonio's Fabricio Oberto and Francisco Elson — and only later on by two-time NBA MVP Tim Duncan. "Got up and played him, and did a terrific job."

How to get Boozer back in for Tuesday's Game 2, then, may be the Jazz's most-pressing question at practice this morning.

Several from Utah had ideas Sunday.

"Get him the ball," forward Andrei Kirilenko said.

"Give them credit. They played pretty good on him," Kirilenko added. "But we should use him. We should give him ball more. We should play particular plays for him, involve him a little bit more."

Veteran guard Derek Fisher's idea was "to move the basketball more."

"When the ball stayed on one side a lot," he said, "I think we aborted a lot of our continuity plays and a lot of the motion in the things we like to do. It just seemed like the ball got stuck."

If the Jazz simply execute their prescribed offense better, Fisher added, "then we can get the ball to Boozer in better scoring positions."

Boozer, meanwhile, had a couple ideas of his own.

One centered on staying out of foul trouble.

"Some of (the fouls) came, I was just trying to help out and I got back slower," he said. "I have to trust my teammate, so if I go, somebody will take my man."

Another was rather rudimentary for the Jazz's leading scorer both from the regular season and in the ongoing playoffs.

"I," Boozer said, "have to be more aggressive."

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E-mail: tbuckley@desnews.com