The Setting Suns in Phoenix: Too Little, Too Late

Boris Diaw came out with a 20 pt, 10 rbd, 8 asst game while Raja Bell shot the lights out with his own 27 pt contribution to rout the Spurs at home to stay in the series and keep from being embarassingly swept from the first round of the playoffs. Despite their best efforts though, the Suns are simply delaying the inevitable, because it's too little too late for them to really expect to get out of their 3-1 deficit in the series. I'm not just talking about how it's nearly impossible to come back from a 3-0 deficit in a 7 game series in the NBA, or how no team in the NBA has never done it before. The fact remains is that the Spurs were and still are a better team than the Suns, but even then, that's beside the point.

While I think the Spurs still would've won out on the series, what has really made this series so open and close has really been the Suns themselves. This series was supposed to be the ultimate test of the Shaq for Marion trade, it was supposed to be a revival of last year's round 2 rivalry, and instead, it's turned into the annual trouncing of a 3 seed over a 6 seed. The disparity of play just seems to be that way. How come? Why is it turning out this way? I could answer how Grant Hill's health has not held up and thus has not been able to defend as Shawn Marion did and not contribute, I can argue how Bowen hounding Nash has kept him from his usual production (he was limited to, 15 pts and 4 assts last game and 7 pts, 9 assts the game before). The fact however, of the loss, lies in the attitude that the Suns carried to each game. The Suns always have this attitude of being as good, if not better than the Spurs coming into the series, and in all honesty, they're the underdogs. Game 1 D'Antoni and the rest of the Suns brushed off as a fluke, Nash said they simply had to work on their offense, and Shaq claimed that, "the floppers prevailed." The Spurs got lucky, then they held home court by showing some more of their "luck" trouncing the Suns 102-96 in Game 2. Then of course when the Suns get home, the Spurs pull another fluke of a "near perfect game" embarassing Suns further in Game 3 with a 115-99 victory. Game 4 is just too little too late. The attitude of overconfidence has been the downfall of the Suns. They think that their offense can run through a system like San Antonio, they think that last year was a fluke, resting solely on the fact that Amare was suspended.

Given how Boris Diaw played last season and most of this season, I don't think the Suns can bank him having a repeat performance of Game 4. Unfortunately for Phoenix, I don't know that they have much choice. They're too far out to keep the series interesting, and the only thing that kept them from doing that was themselves.