The Indiana Pacers travel to Salt Lake City to face the Utah Jazz at Vivint Arena on Friday.

The Pacers (12-9) suffered a disappointing loss on Wednesday, being beaten by the Sacramento Kings. Those two clubs have built a bit of a rivalry because they swapped some massive pieces in a trade last season. Tyrese Haliburton was the peach of that deal, and he's proving to be one of the best point guards in the NBA. He's got over 50 assists across the last five games and has only committed one turnover in that span. That's hard even to fathom, and it's a beautiful pairing with Myles Turner. That makes it hard to understand why Indiana is talking about trading Turner because he's one of the best all-around centers in the NBA.

The Jazz (13-11) looked to be dangerous when they started the year with a 10-3 record, but it's been a struggle since then. They actually have a 3-8 record since that nightmare start, grabbing a win over the Los Angeles Clippers in their most recent game. The direct correlation with the poor stretch is an injury to Mike Conley. The veteran was a leader for this young group, and it's tough for these guys to play without him. What it has done is allow Collin Sexton to start, though. The acquisition from the Cleveland Cavaliers really struggled behind Conley, but he's back to his 20-point ways in this expanded role. If they can get him to do that off the bench when Conley returns, maybe this club can get back to where they were a few weeks ago. With all that said, this was projected to be one of the worst teams in the NBA at the beginning of the year and it feels like those assumptions are starting to show through.

Indiana swept the two-game season series over Utah last year. That snapped a three-game winning streak by Utah before that.