The third and fifth picks in the 2025 NBA draft face off against each other as the Philadelphia 76ers take on the Utah Jazz at the Delta Center on Saturday night. VJ Edgecombe is coming off a career high 38 point and 11 assist performance as the 76ers dismantled the Sacramento Kings on Thursday night. Ace Bailey also filled up the stat sheet in a pasting of the Giannis-less Milwaukee Bucks, scoring 33 points and adding 9 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 steals. This is the first time the two high draft picks have played against each other as VJ sat out the earlier meeting in Philly on March 4th.<\/p>\n
Saturday\u2019s match up is an opportunity for the 76ers, who have a firm grasp on a play-in berth, but are also in the running to sneak into the top six in the Eastern Conference. With Embid doubtful and Tyrese Maxey sidelined with a finger injury, VJ Edgecombe and fellow rookie, Justin Edwards, have a chance to build on their combined 70 point performance in Sacramento.<\/p>\n
Standing in their way, of course, are Ace Bailey and the Utah Jazz. There are no play-in or playoff dreams this year, as the Jazz were (officially) eliminated from all of that earlier this week. We\u2019ve known for a while that this season is not about winning, but about growth and development. Ace has certainly taken on the challenge, averaging just under 24 points a game in the last three full games he\u2019s played. The development of Cody Williams has also been exciting to watch. In his last 10 games he has almost doubled his season points average and has a new-found confidence in his shot making and drives to the basket. The Jazz have some intriguing periphery players, like Bez Mbeng, Blake Hinson and Andersson Garcia (\u201cDouble S\u201d as almost no one is calling him), who are trying to make their case for a 2026-2027 roster spot. Add Kennedy Chandler to this mix, a play-making point guard from the G League\u2019s Delaware Blue Coats, who signed a 10 day contact with the Jazz and may see action Saturday night.<\/p>\n
OUT: Jaren Jackson Jr (left knee surgery), Jusuf Nurkic (nose surgery), Walker Kessler (shoulder surgery), Lauri Markkanen (hip injury), Keyonte George (hamstring)<\/p>\n
DAY-TO-DAY: Isaiah Collier (hamstring soreness), Brice Sensabaugh (illness), John Konchar (quad)<\/p>\n
OUT: Joel Embid (oblique), Tyrese Maxey (finger), Kelly Oubre Jr (elbow). Johni Broome (meniscus tear surgery)<\/p>\n
How to watch Philadelphia 76ers vs Utah Jazz<\/p>\n
Date: Saturday March 21, 2026<\/p>\n
Location: The Delta Center, Salt Lake City, Utah<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The third and fifth picks in the 2025 NBA draft face off against each other as the Philadelphia…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":669594,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3785],"tags":[7,423,52756,6,422,427,8572,3972],"class_list":["post-669593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-utah-jazz","tag-basketball","tag-jazz","tag-jazz-game-preview","tag-nba","tag-utah","tag-utah-jazz","tag-utah-jazz-game-coverage","tag-utahjazz"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116263881612949176","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=669593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669593\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/669594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=669593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=669593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=669593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}