Salt Lake City, UT – Randy Foye scored a team-high 17 points off the bench for the Jazz, who defeated the Los Angeles Lakers, 95-86, on Wednesday.
Foye caught fire in the fourth, draining four 3-pointers in the period, and Al Jefferson posted a double-double with 16 points and 10 boards for the Jazz, who snapped a three-game skid.
"Oh man, I was feeling it," Foye said. "I've got to give a lot of credit to my teammates, my teammates found me at the right spots and I just knocked down the shots."
Mo Williams, who has led Utah in scoring over the first four games, scored 16 on 8-of-13 shooting and dished out seven assists in the victory.
Kobe Bryant scored a game-high 29 points and Dwight Howard added 19 points and nine boards for the Lakers, who were coming off their first win of the season against the Pistons after dropping their first three.
The Jazz led all of the opening quarter. Jefferson poured in eight of his points in the first, helping Utah out to a 25-17 advantage heading into the second.
Williams, who scored 10 in the second period, drained a 19-footer to extend Utah's lead to 15 just over four minutes in. The Jazz maintained a double- digit advantage until Bryant hit a pair of free throws with 2:29 to go, but Williams buried another jumper to give the Jazz a 51-41 lead at halftime.
The Lakers made a push late in the third to make it a 60-56 game with 1:57 left in the quarter. They embarked on a 9-0 run, with Steve Blake hitting a three during the stretch to cut the deficit to single-digits, but the Jazz pushed the advantage back to eight, entering the final period at 65-57.
Metta World Peace knocked down a three to reduce Utah's lead to five with 7:39 remaining in the fourth, but the Jazz did not wilt. Randy Foye caught fire and drained 3-pointers on three consecutive possessions to build the lead back to 11 at 79-68.
Bryant scored the Lakers final 14 points, but it wasn't enough for Los Angeles, which has surprisingly dropped four of its first five games.
"I thought we didn't play well offensively," Lakers coach Mike Brown said. "I can count on both hands and both feet how many wide-open shots we had, especially from the three-point line, that you hope or think is going to go in. Every wide-open three that we missed or every time we went up to try to dunk the ball or lay it in and it got stripped or it got knocked out of our hands, it made us tighten up a little bit more. Again, we didn't do a good job of moving on to the next play."
Game Notes
The Lakers will return home to play six straight before heading on the road again ... The Jazz turned 19 Lakers turnovers into 19 points ... Los Angeles went to the free throw line 46 times, connecting on just 32 shots. The Jazz made 16-of-18 from the line.
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