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OKLAHOMA CITY — Utah Jazz general manager Justin Zanik looked out on the court and saw what he hopes will be his team's future.
Four of the five players on the court for the Oklahoma City Thunder — the top team in the Western Conference — were players it had drafted.
"We're a couple years behind them," Zanik said on the Jazz broadcast. "But I'm hoping this will be a rivalry again in terms of talent that we used to experience when we were in the playoffs and facing them all the time."
The already obvious gap was clear in the fourth quarter when Oklahoma City went on an 11-0 run to break a late tie en route to a 123-114 win over the Jazz at the Paycom Center. But Utah's injury report showed it, too.
After a few games of shameless tanking (Collin Sexton and Walker Kessler alternating rest nights, and Lauri Markkanen and John Collins nursing injuries), the Jazz let their top guys play again.
If that was due to the Jazz higher-ups not thinking they could hang with the Thunder, well, the players gave them an awfully good scare on Wednesday.
Utah led by as many as 8 points in the game and was tied with 5:26 remaining.
Collins led the team with 22 points and 12 rebounds, and was a plus-12 on the night. Sexton had 18 points and nine assists, Kessler had 17 points and 15 rebounds and Markkanen added 17 points and six rebounds.
"Our team is learning the competitiveness and physicality and attention to detail it takes to be in the games late," Hardy said.
Next step: learning how to win those games. One thing that helps is having a guy like Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
The Oklahoma City star scored a career-high 54 points (topping his previous high by 9 points) and was 17-for-18 from the free-throw line. He had 13 points in the fourth quarter to help the Thunder pull away. There's a reason he's near the top of the MVP race.
It's hard to find those types of players — no matter what avenue you choose, whether it be draft, trade or free agency.
The Thunder struck gold when it got Gilgeous-Alexander back from the LA Clippers in the Paul George trade in 2019 offseason. Five seasons and plenty of hits on draft night later, the Thunder are one of the favorites to win the whole darn thing.
Building a bonafide contender is a years-long process for most teams; that's one of the reasons the Jazz made a forward-thinking trade on Tuesday. Utah sent out three future draft picks projected to be in the 20s for the Phoenix Suns' unprotected first-round pick in 2031.
"The three picks we traded have no chance to be the No. 1 pick, and this one does," Zanik explained on the broadcast. "We've always talked about bites at the apple or more swings in the draft, but it also is about the quality of the swings; and this is, in my opinion, the most valuable asset on the market right now."
The Jazz may be more than a "couple years" behind being a championship themselves, but if they do emerge from the rebuild with at least a playoff competitive roster, that pick may loom large in six years.
The Thunder's patience worked; will the Jazz's?
Regardless, Hardy likes the current trajectory of his team.
"I'm the first person to try to be as honest as possible about our group, both to them and to you guys," Hardy said postgame. "And I'm really optimistic about our group going forward. I think that we're showing a lot of strides of being able to learn throughout the season. I think a lot of players are getting better individually, and I think our collective IQ is growing."
