Donovan Mitchell and Utah stifle Warriors gritty comeback, 113-109

The Warriors clawed back into a hard-fought battle with the Utah Jazz, but in the end, Mike Conley and Donovan Mitchell were too much for the injury strapped dubs.

For a team that’s coming off a 48-point loss at the end of a week-long road trip, the Golden State Warriors gave as much effort as you could possibly ask for against the Utah Jazz.

The 15.5-point underdogs battled Utah for 48-minutes of the game. However, in the end, the talent of Donovan Mitchell and Mike Conley overpowered the grit of the understaffed Warriors.

The scrappy Dubs were able to cut down The Jazz’s 21-point lead to single digits in the final minutes, but the team couldn’t manufacture a bucket when it mattered, falling 113-109 in Utah.

When the game got close, the backcourt duo of Mitchell and Conley took over, combining for 57 of their team’s 113 points. Conley’s handling of the pick and roll with Rudy Gobert was a problem all night for Golden State’s lowly defense.

Utah shot 61-percent from the field in the first half and was able to stretch a two-point first-quarter lead into a 14-point lead heading into the locker room at halftime. The Warriors slowly scratched their way back into the game behind a flurry of 3-pointers from an unlikely hero.

Big man Omari Spellman dropped four-threes on four shots behind the arc, with all four coming in the fourth quarter. Spellman had one of his best nights in a Golden State uniform, totaling 18 points with five boards.

Seven players scored in double figures for the Warriors on a night where they only had eight healthy players, and none of them included Stephen Curry, Draymond Green, D’Angelo Russell, or Klay Thompson.

Undrafted rookie, Ky Bowman turned in another impressive performance as the Dubs primary ball-handler, scoring 17 points, with five assists and four steals. Bowman had a crafty steal that led to a powerful dunk to cut the Jazz lead to six with less than two minutes to play. Bowman is currently on a two-way contract, but has easily played his way onto the Warriors full-time roster for the 2019-20 season.

After a four-game road swing, the Warriors will now get a rare weekend off and hope for good news on the returns of Kevon Looney and Draymond Green. Both bigs could return as soon as Monday against Oklahoma City, providing a much-needed boost to the Warriors injury-riddled roster.