57 points from Game 1 but it will take more to win, crying emoji

He was one of those people who had the focus at the dawn of this series, because without a Donovan Mitchell there was no way the Jazz could worry the Denver machine. Mission accomplished for Spida with an absolutely sensational game, mission messed up for Utah who was unable to ride the burning wings of his rear. Hard.

There are these evenings anyway … You plant 57 pawns for the opening of the Playoffs, you pass the immense Karl Malone in the ranking of the greatest perfs in the history of your franchise, you become the third most offensive player in a game … in Playoff history just behind legends like Michael Jordan and Elgin Baylor … but you lose the game to a guy with a toilet broom instead of hair. Wow. What more could Donovan Mitchell do tonight? Boarf, three times nothing. One more pass here, a successful lay-up there, but clearly Spida isn’t to blame tonight, would miss more than that. Sometimes Russell Westbrook on his angry penetrations, sometimes Luka Doncic on his very gentle step-backs, often Dwyane Wade with his unmistakable arabesques, Donovan Mitchell did absolutely everything in the defense of the Nuggets tonight, and a Torrey Craig much too abandoned by the Morris or Murray sent on him. We say to ourselves that Gary Harris is terribly missed by this Denver team, but tonight Dono did not bother to think about the absent.

57 points at 19/33 shooting including 6/15 from the parking lot and 13/13 from the throw, 9 rebounds, 7 assists and 1 steal in 43 minutes

A festival started in the second quarter after some stammering, then nothing more then stopped the boy. All-time performance for the reasons indicated in the preamble, and above all in the impression left in the end, an impression which makes us say that today Donovan Mitchell IS the Jazz, and that Donovan Mitchell seems… no longer sufficient for him- even. The absences of Bojan Bogdanovic or Mike Conley, the obligation for Quin Snyder to launch a no name in a series of Playoffs (Juwan Morgan), the poverty of the attack if we except the iso-Dono and the skills of old Joe Ingles, a rather scary set finally against a team of the Nuggets which will have played an average game, even very weak in defense, and who will only need a warm stroke – also formidable – from Jamal Murray to win.

Is the Jazz in big trouble on this series? probably. Does that take anything away from Donovan Mitchell’s stratospheric performance? Absolutely not. The guy just appeared like hell and the same night in all-time charts with Karl Malone or Michael Jordan, so re-read this sentence and enjoy your herbal tea.

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