Shake, rattle and roll — After earthquake, Jazz cruise to big win over Warriors

OAKLAND, Calif., — Forward Matt Harpring predicted a playoff atmosphere for the Jazz's 2007-08 NBA regular-season opener.

He was right, though not necessarily for all the predictable reasons.

A crowd of 19,823 was into it at the start, but faded fast. The atmosphere was electric early on, albeit not for long. And sold-out Oracle Arena quite literally was shaking, though this time because an earthquake — measuring 5.6 on the Richter scale, its epicenter 40-some miles away near San Jose, Calif. — rumbled during a first-quarter break in play.

Much more than all that, it was because the Jazz acted Tuesday night a lot like they did against Golden State last postseason — having almost all go their way en route to a 117-96 victory over the Warriors.

By the time they were packing to leave, in fact, the '07 Western Conference finalist Jazz were feeling even better about themselves than just a few short months ago.

"I really feel if you measure where we are right now to where we were last year," co-captain Carlos Boozer said, "we're better defensively, we have better chemistry, we're very strong leadership-wise.

"But we have a long way to go."

Or do they?

Utah — which eliminated Golden State 4-1 in their second-round series last May — was up 62-51 at the break, and shot 51.1 percent from the field (24-of-47) during an opening half in which it led by as many 15 points.

The Jazz — who had few worries in the second half, and even were oblivious to the relatively mild quake — got plenty from four of their five starters as they won their fifth straight season opener.

But no one contributed more than Boozer, whose 32-point, 15-rebound double-double prompted starting point guard Deron Williams to blurt "Do I have to answer that?" when asked if the Jazz's power forward was in midseason form.

"I thought we played well for our first game," said Williams, who added 24 points and eight assists while shooting 8-of-15. "We came out a little sluggish, but we were able to stand our ground and keep just playing our game."

Even Jerry Sloan was pleased.

"I thought we played a lot better," Jazz coach Jerry Sloan said, "than I had originally anticipated."