PHILADELPHIA — Jimmy Butler got free.

Miscommunication between Joe Ingles and Rudy Gobert on an inbounds play left the newest Philadelphia 76er wide open under the basket for an easy layup with under 20 seconds remaining. The play put Philly up by four and helped the 76ers to a 113-107 win, as the Jazz stalled out down the stretch.

In Philly’s final possessions, the Jazz helped unnecessarily, left men open, and fouled too much as the 76ers scored the final eight points to spoil a spirited Jazz run that lasted for the better part of the final three quarters.

It was the Jazz's second straight loss, dropping them to 7-8 on the year.

Here are the takeaways from Friday's loss.

The final minutes

“We played with a lot of passion,” Donovan Mitchell said. “Philly is a great team. We had the game in the bags. If we don't make a few mistakes, the game goes the other way.”

The big one was the Butler play. Embiid set a back screen and Butler ran around it into the paint and was wide open. It wasn’t anything special; a set that's run dozens of times a game by teams. The Jazz just had poor communication on the play. Ingles thought Gobert would help. Gobert didn’t think Ingles needed it. Ingles tried to intercept the pass and when he didn’t, Butler was left all alone.

“Every play usually starts with a back screen,” Gobert said. “I didn’t think he needed help on that.”

Poor communication — it’s as simple as that.

It wasn’t the only mistake made in the final minutes. Philadelphia shot seven free throws in the final 2:12 and bad help decisions left Philly with wide open for looks. Suddenly it was an 8-0 run and a Philly victory.

The Jazz only scored four points after Ricky Rubio put Utah up 103-100 with 3:08 remaining.

Which leads to the next takeaway…

The shooting

The Jazz were cold from deep against Philly, shooting 18 percent (4-for-22). The thing is: this isn’t a new problem.

Heading into Friday’s game, the Jazz shot corner threes on 10.7 percent of their possessions — the second highest percentage in the league — but hit just 28.5 percent on those shots, according to Cleaning The Glass. Only the Chicago Bulls have shot a lower percentage this season.

The problem isn’t just about the corner three, either, it’s about the long ball in general. Utah was 24th in the league coming into the Philly game, shooting 33 percent from behind the arc.

Utah is great at creating open shots by using off-ball screens to free players up. But open shots still need to be made, and the Jazz aren’t making very many.

Before Friday’s game, Donovan Mitchell was shooting 32 percent from 3-point land when defenders were 4 feet or more away, Ricky Rubio was shooting 29 percent on such shots and Jae Crowder was hitting 33 percent of his open triple looks. Those three all shoot more 3-pointers than anyone on the Jazz not named Joe Ingles.

So is it a cold spell or something more?

Crowder is a 34 percent career 3-point shooter, Rubio is a 32 percent career 3-point shooter and Mitchell is shooting 33 percent in his, albeit, very short career from distance.

Those three Jazzmen are shooting worse than their career averages, but none of them are above average career 3-point shooters in the first place. So more performances like the 4-of-22 could be in Utah’s future.

Donovan the chucker

Mitchell scored 31 points. But he needed 35 shots to get there.

“I took 35 shots — that can’t happen,” Mitchell said. “Zero assists. That’s not who I am, that’s not who I’ve been. I have to be aggressive, but I have to be smart.”

Mitchell was aggressive early, firing up 19 shots in the first half alone. It’s one thing if he hit most of them, but outside a run in the fourth quarter where he displayed some fabulous shot making — a crossover for a midrange jumper and a 3-pointer that put the Jazz up three with under four minutes remaining — he was mostly off the mark. Mitchell finished 13-of-35 and 1-of-11 from 3-point range.

As for the bad shooting?

“We can only get better,” Mitchell said.

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