The Utah Jazz travel to Arizona to face the Phoenix Suns at Footprint Center on Monday.

The Jazz (30-18) are in their worst stretch of the season right now, entering this matchup losing seven of their last nine games. That's Utah's worst stretch in two years, but it's easy to understand why. The poor stretch started when Rudy Gobert landed in COVID protocols, and it continues with Donovan Mitchell landing in concussion protocols over the weekend. Those two run the show for this talented team, and they simply don't have enough without their best offensive player and the best defender in the lineup. In any case, Utah still sits third in the west, and they have quite the cushion with everyone else middling around .500.

The Suns (36-9) have the best record in the NBA, and they're putting some separation between them and the Golden State Warriors. It was Chris Paul who helped get them to the Finals last year, and he's in the midst of another sensational season. He's leading the NBA in assists, collecting 18 points, four rebounds, 16 assists and four steals in the most recent win on Saturday. Performances like that are hard to understand from a guy who's been around for nearly 20 years, and it looks like he's dipped into the fountain of youth. What makes the run even more amazing is the fact that they've been missing Deandre Ayton for about half the season. He's one of the keys to this team, and it's scary to think how good they'll look when he's back and fully healthy. In any case, JaVale McGee ad Bismack Biyombo have been an amazing one-two punch filling in for him.

Phoenix dominated this series last year, sweeping the three-game season series. With that said, Utah won 15 of their previous 16 games in this series before that, dating back to 2015.