Utah Jazz earn key win against familiar foe News Houston rockets

If the Jazz happen to face Houston in the first round of the playoffs for a third-straight year, they can only hope the series goes as well as the last two ? and as well as things did down the stretch in a regular-season meeting Wednesday night. Because the way things were clicking late in a 101-94 win over the Rockets at sold-out EnergySolutions Arena, it was as if the Jazz ? 38-23 and winners now of nine straight ?

were ready already to move on to second-round postseason play. Though not before again bidding farewell to a familiar foe, one Utah has faced ? including the playoffs ? 23 times since the start of the 2006-07 regular season. "It makes it a fun game," Jazz guard Ronnie Brewer said of the frequent meetings with a 39-23 Houston club now playing without star Tracy McGrady (microfracture knee surgery). "Because it's always a battle." And it's one the Jazz have won more often than not, often thanks to finishes like that on Wednesday and performances like those by point guard Deron Williams, who had a game-high 26 points and dished a game-high 14 assists, and power forward Carlos Boozer, who scored 20 and pulled down a game-high 17 for his first double-double since returning a week-and-a-half ago from arthroscopic knee surgery. "He definitely looked like his old self tonight," Williams said of Boozer, who logged 34 minutes Wednesday and now has played five games after missing three-plus months. "Finished a game for the first time, had some big rebounds, made some big plays down the stretch for us." "He's slowly but surely getting back in his rhythm, back in his game, and DWill did a phenomenal job of feeding the ball in his comfort zone ? right down the elbow, where he's able to shoot the shot," Brewer added. "He was attacking the basket really well, and his numbers speak for themself." A 16-foot Williams-fed jumper from Boozer broke an 85-85 tie that came with four minutes and 33 seconds remaining, and only after Houston whittled away what had been a 13-point Utah lead in the third quarter. Two fastbreak layups from Brewer followed, as did another Boozer jumper. But what really did the trick for the Jazz was a 20-footer from Williams, preceded by a couple killer crossovers, that answered a 3-pointer by 25-point Rockets team-high scorer Ron Artest and made it 97-92 Utah with 21.4 seconds to go. "I thought that was the shot that finally broke them," Williams said after the Jazz, still seventh in the NBA's Western Conference, pulled to within a half-game of both fourth-place Portland and fifth-place Houston. Equally damaging to the Rockets had to be the foul-out of 7-foot-6 center Yao Ming with 1:23 to go. It happened when Brewer, who yields 11 inches and 92 pounds to the 310-pound Yao, fell to the floor as he took a charge away from the ball by the giant from China. "It was a huge play for us," Brewer said. "Coach (Jerry Sloan) was like, 'You've got to bump him when he comes across the middle.' So I'm trying to bump, and he just moved me out of the way every time. "So I'm like, 'Man, I've got to try to do something to make him not as effective.' So I stood my ground. He was scoring, so he wanted the ball. So he just tried to go through me, and I fell down and the ref was right there to make the call." Yao, however, was not nearly as impressed. "Every time a defender is on the ground, even if he just wants to sit down and have a rest, it's my offensive foul. That's unfair," he said. "I know I have 300 pounds, but the same way people pushed me I have to really limit my strength to push back. "I guess I don't need to worry about flopper next game," he added with a look ahead to Houston's coming game against Phoenix. "I don't think Shaq (Shaquille O'Neal) is that type of player." E-mail: tbuckley@desnews.com