Jazz may be young but are experienced

With the NBA trade deadline now past, the Utah Jazz remain one of the youngest teams in the league.

"Experience is hard to come by," said coach Jerry Sloan, whose team made no 11th-hour trades to get bigger or older.

But despite that youth, Sloan has great respect for the maturity of 23-year-old point guard Deron Williams, who brought a lot with him when he was drafted No. 3 overall by the Jazz in 2005.

"Deron is one of the unusual players that comes in this league as young as he was to show he's a talent and show his intelligence to step out and do things (in) situation basketball," Sloan said.

"He's as good as you can get knowing that at this early age. Most guys it takes a little bit longer.

"When he came here, he had tremendous knowledge and knew what was going on."

Sloan noted that Williams gets things on the first take.

"You don't have to tell him a dozen times, remind him what he's supposed to do. Other people it takes a little bit longer. That's just who he is.

"For a first-year player (in 2005-06), I thought he came in and picked up a lot of stuff. He's gotten better all the time," said Sloan, pointing to how well Williams played against Golden State Tuesday — 29 points and a dozen assists, his 31st double-double. "He had a wonderful game," said Sloan.

FLYING HIGH: Sloan has some worry about whether the Jazz players will fall in love with that racetrack type of game they played Tuesday to beat Golden State.

"I'm sure there's a certain extent of that. The way we finished the game is always concern," he said of the lack of defense and of letting the Warriors inch closer after Utah had a lead of 25 with three minutes left in the third quarter.

Forward Matt Harpring thinks the Jazz will, however, stay grounded. "I don't think we can get too high with Coach. I don't think he lets that happen — and we don't have a mentality like that."

The Jazz are too hard on themselves for it to go to their heads, despite their youth. "I think so, and if we're not, then Sloan soon would be," Harpring said.

HE'LL PLAY: Power forward Carlos Boozer did not practice Wednesday or attend an autograph session that evening due to a sore lower back that he said "flared up" on him in Tuesday's home win over the Warriors. But he did practice Thursday and said he would not miss tonight's game.