After watching the first quarter of basketball between the Phoenix Suns and Brooklyn Nets on Friday morning, two things were crystal clear: the Brooklyn Nets did not come to China to mess around, and 5 a.m. is really early to wake up to watch a basketball game.
Watching Brooklyn thoroughly outplay Phoenix in the first half certainly did not help anyone’s mood if you rolled out of bed early to watch this one. But the Suns eventually woke up, and the Suns’ youth plus Jordan Goodwin and Nigel Hayes-Davis led Phoenix to a 132-127 overtime victory.
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Jordan Goodwin led the Suns with 19 points, including the game-sealing 3-point win. While Devin Booker and Dillon Brooks each finished with 18 points. Cam Thomas finished the game with 22 points to lead the Nets.
3 Takeaways
The first takeaway from this game is that the Suns’ offense was very disjointed and clunky for most of this game. The starters struggled to find any flow in the half-court, and the Nets forced everyone but Booker to play isolation basketball. Brooks and Grayson Allen often found themselves creating their own shots, which is not a winning formula for the Suns long term. Ryan Dunn and Oso Ighodaro were nowhere to be seen offensively in the first half.
The offense improved in the second half once Booker got free for some open looks and the Nets let their foot off the gas defensively, but when the bench came, the ball stopped moving again. The Suns finished the game 11-of-42 from 3, and shot 44% from the field overall. They did outscore the Nets 25-14 in fastbreak points and got 12 more shots than the Nets did throughout the game, two keys to success for head coach Jordan Ott.
The second takeaway is a positive one! Rasheer Fleming and Khaman Maluach both showed a lot of upside in the fourth quarter and overtime of this game.
Fleming’s already a natural cutter and is excellent at timing his movement to get open shots. Maluach’s foot speed staying in front of guards on defense is impressive for someone so young in his career. Maluach also had some nice passes in the high post to cutters; he might already have more assists to backdoor cutters than the last franchise center the Suns drafted. The athleticism for both Maluach and Fleming popped in moments throughout the end of the game, especially Fleming’s multiple blocks from behind that were electric.
The third and final takeaway from this was resiliency. While the Suns had to grind out a win where they did not shoot the ball well, the energy and effort were still where they needed to be for 53 minutes. The Suns’ defense in the third quarter was airtight, holding the previously red-hot Nets to 13 points, outscoring them 31-13. The communication, movement, pace, and continuity were all positive as the Suns turned a 12-point halftime deficit into an 89-84 lead at the end of the third quarter and ultimately pulled out an overtime win.
First Half
Before I was even able to rub the sleep out of my eyes, Cam Thomas and the Nets had a 20-4 lead, which ballooned out to a 26-8 lead. The Nets started a perfect 10-0f-10 from the field, and the Suns were out of sync.
The Nets were determined to make anyone outside of Devin Booker beat them, and it worked early. Terance Mann followed Booker up and down the court, through screens and handoffs, and held him to without a field goal for an entire half. Booker did not force the issue, which is unsurprising during the preseason because his teammates need to become comfortable with the ball, because this is a strategy we will see countless times this season.
With the Suns’ second option, Jalen Green, on the bench due to injury, it became the Dillon Brooks show, who finished the game with 18 points, on 7 for 18 shooting, and only made two 3-point attempts.
However, it was not just Brooks in the first half; with the Nets staying home defensively on drives and not letting Booker find a rhythm, they forced Grayson Allen, Collin Gillespie, Oso Ighodaro, and Ryan Dunn to score in isolation. That did not go well for the Suns. They shot an abysmal 4-of-18 from deep in the first half, and outside of transition offense, the Suns could not find any consistency in their half-court offense.
The Suns struggled defensively to get stops and rebound the ball, as well. Thomas, Michael Porter Jr., and Nic Claxton were effective against a Suns defense that did not start the game with high intensity. The Nets led 71-59 at halftime.
Second Half and OT
The second half was a completely different story for the Suns, who upped their defensive intensity and communication, resulting in much easier offense on the other end. Booker scored 12 points in the third quarter, including two pull-up threes, one in transition and the other off a ball screen. The Suns moved the ball better offensively, resulting in better driving lanes and easy finishes for Ighodaro, who struggled in the first half.
After righting the ship and stabilizing in the third quarter, Booker, Brooks, and the rest of the starters headed to the bench early in the fourth quarter.
The Suns finished the game with Jordan Goodwin, Jared Butler, Rasheer Fleming, Khaman Maluach, and Nigel Hayes-Davis for the rest of the game. Butler was maestro on the floor for the fourth quarter and struggled. Turnovers, missed shots, and overall sloppy play hurt his team immensely. The Suns found themselves down 119-112 before finishing the quarter in a flurry to send this game into overtime. Maluach and Hayes-Davis each had impressive finishes of their own to propel the Suns’ comeback late into the game, and Butler turned his poor night around with a driving layup and two free throws to tie the game up at 121-121.
Now to overtime…
The Suns were now in rhythm after their late surge to send this game into overtime, and it became the Jordan Goodwin show. He scored six of the Suns’ 11 points in overtime, driving to the basket and getting fouled, and had this game-sealing play.
Even in the preseason, it still feels so good to celebrate a Suns win.
The Suns will have a rematch vs the Nets Sunday morning at 4 a.m. Arizona time at Venetian Arena in Macao, China.