ORLANDO – Entering Saturday, one team was 0-6 on the road, in the fifth night of a seven-game road trip and obviously sleep-deprived from having played – and lost – a night earlier in Brooklyn. Meanwhile, the other team came in 4-2 at home, seemingly rested from having two nights off to recover from a trip of its own and desperate to get back to the style of play that helped it thrive early in the season.
However, all throughout a bizarre Saturday night it was difficult to tell much of a difference between the slumping Utah Jazz and an Orlando Magic team that sat atop the Eastern Conference as recently as two weeks ago.