Utah Jazz: Jazz can't deliver with the Mailman watching

SALT LAKE CITY — Karl Malone and Greg Miller were both in EnergySolutions Arena at the same time Monday.

While that served as an intriguing subplot considering their recent war of words, they were not officially the main event nor the most exciting part of this night.

The San Antonio Spurs and Utah Jazz put on quite the show of their own — on the court, mind you, not on a radio talk show or on a blog.

Unfortunately for Jazz fans, however, the wrong Jefferson made the clutch shot down the stretch.

Utah's defense, concentrating on Tony Parker, Tim Duncan and, yes, Matt Bonner, couldn't rotate quick enough to catch up to a wide-open Richard Jefferson, whose 3-pointer with 6.5 seconds remaining was the biggest shot of the 106-102 San Antonio win.

That winning trey — taken with Jazz bench players closer to the Spurs' shooter than any Utah guys on the court — came moments after Jazz center Al Jefferson missed a game-tying, 18-foot jumper on the other end.

"We did a good job and they just made a spectacular pass," Jazz coach Tyrone Corbin said. "We were rotating, the guys were fighting hard, man. We didn't want to leave Bonner, so there was one man out of the rotation because we stayed home on him. They made the extra pass, and Jefferson made the tough shot."

The 3-pointer was a punch in the gut to a stumbling Jazz team that desperately needed a win and played well enough to get win for much of this exciting showdown.

Despite holding a lead as big as 11 points, Utah was defeated for the second outing in two days and the ninth time in 12 contests. It dropped the Jazz's record to 15-16, marking their first wandering into sub-.500 land since they were 2-3 on Jan. 2.

"It's a disappointing loss. I thought the guys really competed hard," Corbin said. "We gave ourselves a chance to win the game down at the end. We just have to keep fighting."

The Jazz have one last chance to even their record before the All-Star break — which would be a better spot that most predicted they'd be in before the season — when they visit Minnesota on Wednesday.

Utah is in last place in the Northwest Division and trails the Timberwolves (16-17) by one one-thousandth of a percentage point (.484 to .485).

"We've still got a lot to work on," Jazz power forward Paul Millsap said. "We've got to work on closing our games. We're standing in there in the fourth quarter, but just not coming out with the win at the end."