PHOENIX — After Saturday’s third game in nine days against the Houston Rockets, the Phoenix Suns will have 22 games remaining on the schedule.
Thirteen will face the NBA’s best of the best, a group of seven teams that are all at least 17 games above .500 and enter play Friday.
Phoenix still has two games left against the Boston Celtics (46-12), Cleveland Cavaliers (38-20), Denver Nuggets (41-19), Los Angeles Clippers (37-20), Minnesota Timberwolves (42 -17) and Oklahoma City Thunder. (41-18), with one more against the Milwaukee Bucks (39-21).
The other nine games include four opponents above .500. It’s a grueling time to end the season, and it comes as Phoenix is competing to stay out of the play-in tournament.
Currently fifth in the Western Conference, the 35-24 Suns will be in the mix alongside the 35-25 New Orleans Pelicans, 34-25 Dallas Mavericks, 33-25 Sacramento Kings, 33-25 Los Angeles Lakers Angeles 33-28 and Golden 31-27. State Warriors. The Lakers, Mavericks and Warriors are all currently in good shape. The Pelicans have been solid since losing five in a row in early November, having only four losing streaks total since. Sacramento is the only team with slight volatility at the moment.
How Phoenix compares to true NBA title contenders will not only tell us how ready it is for the playoffs, but will also likely determine its fate between avoiding the tournament or not.
“I think that’s the way it should be,” Suns guard Devin Booker said Thursday. “You want to play these games at the end of the season [against] teams that you might see that are already ramping up and just getting a taste of what the playoffs will look like.
There are two particularly grueling sections of the schedule. With OKC visiting on Sunday, Denver, the Toronto Raptors, Boston, Cleveland and Boston will follow. And the last 10 games of the year are Denver, OKC, New Orleans, Cleveland, Minnesota, New Orleans, Clippers back-to-back, Sacramento and Minnesota again.
Sunday’s Thunder game will be a great benchmark to show us how ready the Suns are for this. Obviously, Bradley Beal’s health (left hamstring injury management) looms over not only this game but the rest of the regular season. The Suns need him. NOW. And the good news for them is that he’s listed as probable for Saturday.
OKC has been part of an elite basketball team this season. Third in offensive rating and fourth in defensive rating, the Thunder are the only other team in the top five of both, aside from Boston (first and second, respectively).
They are led by MVP candidate Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and are incredibly efficient. Gilgeous-Alexander (31.2 points per game), Jalen Williams (19.3 PPG) and Chet Holmgren (17.2 PPG) are all shooting 54% from the field.
All of OKC’s perimeter shooters are also sharpshooters except for Josh Giddey (32.1 3P), which helps him lead the NBA in 3-point percentage (39.6%) ) and they also pace the league in free throw percentage (83.2%). The Thunder have seven players attempting at least 2.5 3s per night and Giddey is the only one below 39%.
General manager Sam Presti has done it again, assembling a ball-handling hydra based on basketball IQ, playmaking and versatility off the bounce. Gilgeous-Alexander and Williams are both excellent options leading the offense, and they’re not even the team’s best providers. It’s Giddey. Holmgren, standing at least 7-foot-1, can also do some things with his dribble. First-round pick Cason Wallace is already a perfect 3 and D supporting guard and will do that stuff in time as well. OKC also added veteran Gordon Hayward on the buyout market, which fits his style of play perfectly.
This is what modern basketball is and the Thunder were ahead of their time.
The only reason why OKC is not considered among the title favorites is experience. Gilgeous-Alexander and Luguentz Dort are the only holdovers from the playoff rotation during Chris Paul’s year in the bubble. Gilgeous-Alexander (25) and Dort (24) are also the elder statesmen. Williams (22), Holmgren (21), Giddey (21) and Wallace (20) are all puppies.
To compare it to the 2021 Suns who were playoff babies themselves, with the exception of the recently acquired Hayward, there is no Jae Crowder or Paul on this team.
But the Thunder could still qualify for the final this year. They are so talented and a team. This is a striking sample of what awaits the Suns over the last six weeks.
