SALT LAKE CITY — Brice Sensabaugh has a goal for his third NBA season.

“This year is the time for me to solidify myself as an NBA player — undeniably,” he said.

He’s off to a pretty good start.

The Jazz wing had a team-high 26 points in Utah’s 134-130 overtime loss at the San Antonio Spurs on Friday. Sensabaugh is now averaging 25 points in the Jazz’s first two preseason games.

On Friday, he went 6-of-13 from the field and 12-of-12 from the free-throw line, showing an ability to put up big scoring numbers even when his 3-point shot isn’t falling at an insane clip (he was just 2-of-8 from deep).

It’s been a carryover from a standout summer league where he drew “MVP” chants in Salt Lake City. He credits that week in July for giving him some added confidence entering the season.

“There’s a different level of confidence and understanding of what needs to happen for me and for the team,” he said. “I think Summer League was a big boost for me in terms of — even though it’s obviously different than the real game — just like breaking it down and seeing what I can really do as a shooter and other things as my role is going to expand a little bit this year.”

And his second big preseason performance came in a game that was more fun than it had any right to be.

The Jazz came back from a 17-point halftime deficit — albeit against San Antonio’s B and C lineups — to send the game into overtime.

The end of regulation featured big buckets from Ace Bailey, Walt Clayton Jr, Taylor Hendricks, and a game-tying triple from Keyonte George in the waning seconds.

“For us to be in that environment, let our young players play on the road in a close game, I thought was really good for us,” Jazz coach Will Hardy said.

After a somewhat passive game against Houston on Wednesday, Clayton Jr. looked more like the player who led Florida to the national championship last spring.

The rookie scored 20 points on 6-for-12 shooting and added five rebounds and five assists.

“Walt didn’t overcomplicate the game,” Hardy said. “I think he was a little bit more aggressive looking for his shot, which opened up the rest of his game.”

That, alone, showed a moment of growth.

Hardy said that there have been moments in camp where Clayton has been trying to make every play “a little bit too technically perfect,” which has had a limiting effect on his play.

“He’s almost trying to be the good guy, and Walt’s not a selfish player, but one of his best skills at this point in time is his ability to shoot and score,” Hardy said.

Indeed, and when Clayton started shooting, it forced the defense to react, which opened up the rest of his game.

“Some of those layups that he got were because the other team’s having to press up on him because they respect his shooting,” Hardy said. “So I thought a little bit of it was him being more aggressive for himself, not in a selfish way, but it set up the rest of his game.”

Bailey finished with 20 points on 8-of-13 shooting and seven rebounds in 39 minutes of play, giving him consecutive 20-point games in his first two preseason games. Hendricks had 15 points, and Cody Williams had some strong moments in a 12-point night.

“It was a fun game,” Hardy said. “I’m glad our guys get to be in that moment together. It gives us a lot to learn from in terms of the situational part of the game, and so I’m excited to get back to work.”

The Jazz will have their first home preseason game on Monday against the Dallas Mavericks.

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.