1 stud and 1 dud for Cavs from their loss on Tuesday to the Jazz

After the first two games of their current five-game Western road trip, the Cleveland Cavaliers had bowled a split. Cleveland was shredded by Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets on Friday night to open the roadie, and then the Cavaliers hit the gas in the late third quarter and fourth quarter to beat the Phoenix Suns on Sunday night.

The Suns were without both Devin Booker and Chris Paul in that game on Sunday, which has to be acknowledged, but in the same light, the Cavs were sans Donovan Mitchell at Denver on Friday.

From there, Cleveland was set to take on the Utah Jazz on Tuesday night. This was Mitchell’s first game back playing his former team in the Jazz, in Utah, which had to have some added juice to it. Mitchell made the postseason in all of his five seasons with the Jazz, prior to him being traded this now-past offseason to the Cavaliers, and in that blockbuster, Cleveland dealt Collin Sexton and Lauri Markkanen, among other assets, to Utah.

Sexton was not in action again this go-round against his former club in the Cavs, though, as he’s still working his way back from a hamstring injury.

But, this last Cavs game still was a fun one to tune into, and it was great that Utah gave Mitchell a video tribute, and their fans gave him his flowers.

As for the game itself, it was largely a back-and-forth contest, and at halftime, both teams were notted up at 55 all. In the second half, Utah unfortunately proved to be too much, and especially down the stretch, as the Jazz’s offensive rebounding and second chance points, and Jordan Clarkson’s shot creation in the second half were too much for the Cavaliers.

There was also a crucial sequence late when Clarkson hit a triple, and Caris LeVert was called for a flagrant foul for a reckless closeout, Clarkson hit a free throw, Utah got the ball back, he was fouled by LeVert again, and hit three foul shots. That was seven points right then, between the three-point make and the other three free throws from 1:23 through 1:10 in the game that had Utah down 107-102 to up 109-107.

Utah would eventually close the game out, and despite Mitchell and Cleveland being up 101-94 with 6:02 left, the Jazz had it going when it mattered most, and throughout the game, the likes of Lauri Markkanen, Mike Conley and Clarkson (who finished with 32 points) made some key plays. Clarkson, for reference, had 24 second half points. And despite a pretty uneven shooting night from the field for Markkanen, at six-of-18, he did get to the line a bunch, and hit 12-of-14 from there, and added 16 rebounds.

In relation to the Cavs’ perspective, Darius Garland had a solid game with 21 points on eight-of-18 shooting, to go with six assists (albeit to four turnovers). From there, Evan Mobley did eventually foul out, in what was after when the game was essentially lost, but he did have four blocks, and added 12 points and seven rebounds.

Another player that was a bright spot was Lamar Stevens, who had 11 points on five-of-six shooting, and had three steals and two blocks in his 25 bench minutes. He was whistled for five fouls, but he was making his presence felt on defense, and several of his fouls were ones I can live with.

In this last one, however, it was tough for the Cavs in general with Jarrett Allen playing just seven minutes, as he was out the rest of the game because of sickness. Allen, and Isaac Okoro, who played 18 minutes in a start, both were reportedly throwing up, per J.B. Bickerstaff and via Danny Cunningham of ESPN Cleveland; Bickerstaff wasn’t sure if it was something they ate or not. But he wasn’t sure; so clearly, those two enduring that was something that had an impact.

With that said, here, we’ll touch on the Cavs stud and dud from this L to the Jazz.

We’ll begin with the stud for Cleveland next, who was sort of a positive as far as three-point shooting, on a night when the Cavaliers as a team shot just 10-of-37 (27.0 percent) from deep.