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In 1974 a group of nine people, mainly Californians, spent $6.15 million to form the expansion New Orleans Jazz, the eighteenth franchise in the National Basketball Association with "Pistol" Pete Maravich leading the team. The Jazz played their first five years there. Their uniform was naïve in purple and white, infact it was more of a display item for the team logo. The Jazz procured Pete Maravich for a very high price and after trading two players and four draft picks to the Atlanta Hawks. Though the team was unable to record even a single wiining season in its formative nine years, but Marvarich's dribbling, passing and shooting skills helped the Jazz to become one of the leading clubs in the league. Only 23 playoffs were won by the Jazz in 1974-75 season. In 1976, Elgin Baylor (former Los Angeles Lakers player) was employed as their head coach. But even his management could not help out the team. They remained at the bottom of the league.

Darrell Griffith had the league's best three-point field-goal percentage with 36 percent and Eaten earned the title in blocked shots with 4.28 blocks per game. The Jazz were defeated by the Phoenix Suns in 6 games. In 1984 and 1985, the Jazz signed 6-1 guard John Stockton of Gonzaga University and forward Karl Malone of Louisiana Tech University respectively. Though the duo were anonymous players of their time and were not linked with college basketball, they created the most successful guard-forward combination in the account of NBA. For more the 12 seasons, they headed the Jazz to mark successive strokes in some or the other title. To add to this more this energetic pair also became the permanent members of the All-Star team .

In the 1986-87 season, the Jazz acquired Kelly Tripucka and Kent Benson after trading Adrian Dantley to the Detroit Pistons. In the 1988-89 season coach Frank Layden became the team's president and coach Jerry Sloan became the head coach. The Jazz were gradually heading towards success. Karl Malone helped the club to earn a division title by scoring 29.1 points per game and John Stockton lead the league in assists consecutively for the third year. In the 1991-92 season, the Jazz got a brand new state of the art arena known as the Delta Center as their new home arena. They also conquered 8 playoff appearances awards. Following the season, Malone and Stockton became a part of the United States national basketball team and continued to be among the best players in the NBA. In the 1993-94 season, Mark Eaton declared his retirement. The same season Jazz procured Jeff Hornacek from the Philadelphia 76ers. With the introduction of Hornacek, the Jazz became a powerful team. The Jazz won 10 straight games and ended the season with a 53-29 record. By the 1994-95, Stockton had become NBA's all-time assist leader and captured 8th straight assist title. The Jazz's also recorded a franchise best record of 60-22 and finished 2 nd in the Midwest Division. The Jazz once again changed their uniform's look and their logo as well. Their logo featured the purple mountains and the script in blue. The new colors coordinated with the Jazz's outlook. They ruled the Western Conference by recording the franchise's best record of 64-18. In the NBA finals, the Jazz encountered the Chicago Bulls. They lost the first two games. In 6 th game the Jazz fought against the Bulls with full determination but due to their 4 points deficit, Bulls won the World Championship 5 th time in 7 years. Al in all from 1988-89 to 1996-97, the Jazz triumphed in more than 50 games in eight of the nine seasons.