Kennedy Chandler impresses in season debut with Utah Jazz
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Former Tennessee point guard Kennedy Chandler made his return to the NBA on Saturday night, as the 23-year-old suited up for the Utah Jazz and drew rave reviews for his performance.
While the Jazz fell to the 76ers by a score of 126-116, Chandler shined in the first game of his 10-day contract with the team. The former Volunteer tallied 19 points, 5 rebounds and 4 assists in 37 minutes of action. The appearance was Chandler’s first in the NBA since he played for the Memphis Grizzlies as a rookie during the 2022-2023 campaign.
Following the game, Chandler spoke on his mindset amidst this 10-day opportunity and what this performance meant to him.
“I’ve got 6 games out of this 10-day. So I don’t want to do good just this one game,” Chandler said. “I need to finish out strong in all the games, play as hard as I can, watch film, learn, and go from there…”
Utah head coach Will Hardy expressed his praise for Chandler’s performance as well, stating: “I thought he moved the ball great… It’s not easy to do what he just did.”
While with the Delaware Blue Coats in the G-League this season, Chandler has averaged 15.3 points, 2.6 rebounds and 8.9 assists per game, the latter of which leads that association.
Tennessee basketball faces off against Virginia on Sunday night. Here’s a look at the odds, via Kalshi:
Parker is currently the sports editor for the Enterprise-Journal in McComb, Mississippi. He's a graduate from Mizzou who has experience covering the Tiger football and basketball beats for SB Nation, and he's worked for a variety of sports news outlets in the past.
