Beating Lakers meant more than Clippers

The world ‘ or least everyone in Utah ‘ should know by now that Jerry Sloan celebrated his 20th anniversary as head coach of the Jazz on Tuesday.
But what some may not realize is that his first victory as coach of the Jazz came not that night against Dallas, but instead the next ‘ 20 years ago tonight ‘ against the Los Angeles Clippers.
Sloan, though, deems not that, but rather a game player later that month against another Los Angeles team, the Lakers, much more meaningful than No. 1.
Utah had just finished a six-game Eastern road swing with a miserable 1-5 record, including an end-of-the-trip loss to the expansion Miami Heat, when they beat the Lakers 101-87 in a nationally televised home game on Christmas.
The victory sparked a Jazz resurgence of sorts.
‘We kind of came around and started playing better,” Sloan said, ‘and I told them (players) I’d last another couple weeks.”
Make that another couple decades, which allowed Sloan to offer this insightful gem before his Jazz beat the Timberwolves in Minnesota on Tuesday night.
‘I look back at it a little bit,” he acknowledged with reference to that first day on the job.
‘It’s 20 years ago, and you wonder where you’re headed then,” Sloan added. ‘And I’m still wondering the same thing. So, nothing’s really changed.”

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