George Hill faced his former team on Saturday when the Utah Jazz faced the Indiana Pacers. Jazz fans were anxious to see whether Hill would rise to the occasion against a team led by NBA 2k17 cover boy Paul George.
The Vivint Arena crowd left pleasantly surprised.
George Hill lit up Salt Lake City by scoring 30 points while making his former teammate nicknamed PG-13 look very G rated (19 points). He was the leading scorer of the game as he got even more buckets than his All-Star candidate teammates Rudy Gobert (19 points) and Gordon Hayward (27 points).
Indiana was a team that once challenged Lebron in several Eastern Conference playoff matchups. With key players Roy Hibbert, Lance Stephenson and Jazz man George Hill gone, Paul George has helped Basketball USA scrape by at a 22-21 record. Indiana currently has the 7th best record in the Eastern Conference so they would be facing the Toronto Raptors if the playoffs started today.
While the 2k cover curse most likely still lives on for Paul George (only two out of 17 NBA 2k have won an NBA championship the same year they were featured on the game cover), the Jazz look to reverse their own curse that probably began the day Michael Jordan iced their hopes in “The Flu Game”. Jazz fans still disagree on whether or not MJ pushed Bryon Russell the next year in what would be his final season as a Chicago Bull.
Young stars Rudy Gobert and Gordon Hayward (if his old college coach doesn’t cherry pick him to Boston) look to be the faceS of the franchises, its proven vets like George Hill that are pacing the Jazz for playoff success this year and beyond.