The outcome of the game didn’t really matter, but … at least it was an outcome, it was a game … well, sort of.
It was a bit of evidence of what so many around here — including coaches and players — have allowed, sometimes stubbornly, to build up within themselves during an offseason that seemed oh-so scant: optimism for what comes next, what comes now.
The Jazz were so encouraged by their favorable position after the results of last season and their prospects this time around that they changed almost nothing about their team, nothing more than adding a player out of the draft and a renewed emphasis on refining what they already had.