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SALT LAKE CITY – Gordon Hayward got a cold reception in Utah. He has been beaten every day he touched the ball, and his Boston Celtics left town with a loss.
Joe Ingles matched his career high with 27 points and added a season-high seven badists to help the Jazz beat the Celtics 123-115 on Friday night in Hayward's return to Salt Lake City.
Hayward had 13 points and seven badists in 25 minutes during his first game back in Utah since leaving the Jazz as a free agent to the Celtics after the 2016-17 season. He broke his left in Boston's opener last season.
NBA seasons with the Jazz after they drafted him ninth overall in 2010. He averaged 15.7 points, 4.2 rebounds and 3.4 badists for Utah, but took the reaction of Jazz fans in stride.
"I kind of expected some of that," Hayward said. "They were getting me out of the get-go, so it's part of the game."
Boston trimmed a 20-point deficit to four by the fourth quarter. Playing without injured by Kyrie Irving, the Celtics closed in on the occasion late in the period, the final time was 3-pointer from Marcus Smart that made it 111-107 with 2:19 left.
Rudy Gobert quickly answered with a layup that pushed the lead back to six. Jayson Tatum followed by missing back-to-back layups
Jae Crowder finally slammed the door with a corner 3 that gave Utah a 117-109 lead with 47.7 seconds left.
Utah coach Quin Snyder thought his team was tough on the stretch against the Celtics.
"Our team has not been able to handle success during games at times," Snyder said. "We've lost focus sometimes when we've hit shots. Teams are going to come back on you, but you can not make it easy on them. "
Donovan Mitchell scored 21 points for Utah. Crowder had 20, and Gobert finished with 17 points and 15 rebounds. The Jazz won their second straight home game and second in a row overall.
"We picked it up, picked up our energy defensively, picked our focus up," Mitchell said. "We've been having great practices, but we just did not put it into the games. I think about the past couple of games, we've done that. "
Terry Rozier scored a season-high 22 points, and Jayson Tatum added 21 for the Celtics.
Utah to shoot a season-high 56 percent of the field.
"As good as we were defensively in the first nine games," Brad Stevens said. "I thought we actually did an OK job on the initial drives in isolation, but we did not get rebounds in a lot of cases. Our pick-and-roll defense, we just have to really shore it up. "
The Jazz started to pull away when they hit 3-pointers on each of their final possessions of the second quarter to take a 58-51 halftime lead. Ingles accounted for the first three long-distance sneakers, highlighting a 20-point first half for him.
Utah opened the third quarter on a 17-6 run. Mitchell ignited the spurt by draining three free throws and driving for a layup on back-to-back possessions. Derrick Favors kept it going with back-to-back sneakers that gave the Jazz a double-digit lead and finished off with a pair of free throws that put Utah ahead 75-57 just four minutes into the quarter.
"Defensively, we did not pay attention to details," Rozier said. "We just did not have a presence there, so they played freely."
The Jazz built their lead to 83-63 on a layup by Crowder before Boston rallied in the fourth quarter.
The Celtics scored on four straight possessions, culminating in Tatum's layup, to ignite a 15-4 run. Rozier nailed to Utah's lead to 100-96.
Quotable
"I mean, they know. I'll leave it at that. "- Crowder on whether his 20-point performance was motivated by a desire to show the Celtics they made a mistake when they traded to Cleveland before the 2017-18 season.
TIP-INS
Celtics: Smart set with 10 badists, one shy of his career high. Smart also scored 13 points for his first double-double of the season. … Boston had 28 points off 17 Utah turnovers. The Celtics gave up a season-high 35 points in the third quarter.
Jazz: Ingles made 5s, moving him ahead of Deron Williams (511) on Utah's career list. Ingles has 512 3-pointers with the Jazz. … Utah finished with a 45-28 advantage on the boards. … The Jazz scored 50 points in the paint.
UP NEXT
Celtics: At Portland on Sunday.
Jazz: At Memphis on Monday
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