PHOENIX (AP) -No matter how much new coach Alvin Gentry has revved up the Phoenix offense, the Suns can’t keep up with the competition in the West.
A five-game losing streak has Phoenix five games behind eighth-place Dallas, entering Wednesday night’s play, for the final Western Conference playoff berth. With just 18 games to play, and Cleveland coming to town on Thursday night, the Suns are in imminent danger of missing the postseason for the first time since 2004.
Gentry met with his players on Wednesday, a day after Phoenix’s devastating 122-117 home loss to Dallas, to emphasize that all is not yet lost.
“Let’s not kid ourselves, we’ve got an unbelievable uphill battle here,” Gentry said, “but we still have 18 games to play.”
Steve Nash hasn’t missed the playoffs since 1999 and called it “really uncomfortable to be on the outside looking in at this point.”
ssional and play for each other and try to have as much fun as we can and therefore have the best results that we can.”
Throwing in the towel would be the worst, Nash said.
“I would imagine we have enough character in the locker room to stick together, but it is a challenge,” he said. “After a long season to get to this position, and guys can start thinking about summer vacation or just woe is me, it can be difficult.”
Considering all that’s happened to the Suns this season, it’s easy to see how this team that had been among the Western Conference powers the past four years has slipped so far.
“It’s been crazy,” Grant Hill said. “You can write a book. It would be an interesting story.”
Or as Nash said, “We’ve never really caught our rhythm, or caught a break for that matter.”
It began at the end of last season, when the architect of the Suns’ rapid-fire attack, Mike D’Antoni, resigned to coach the New York Knicks rather than go along with general manager Steve Kerr’s wishes for a greater emphasis on defense and an expanded player rotation.
Kerr hired Terry Porter, who tried to install a defense-oriented game and tame the Suns’ style. It never fit, and several of the players balked. The Suns jettisoned two D’Antoni stalwarts, Raja Bell and Boris Diaw, to Charlotte for Jason Richardson.
In the days leading up to the All-Star break, Kerr and owner Robert Sarver, whose banking and real estate interests have taken a massive hit in the economic downturn, flirted with trading Amare Stoudemire or even Shaquille O’Neal.
Instead, Porter was the one to go, fired and replaced by Gentry, who returned the team to the fast-paced style the players – especially Nash – know best.
In the first two games under Gentry, the Suns clobbered the Los Angeles Clippers 140-100 and 142-119. Stoudemire scored 42 in the second game, but it would be his last of the season.
The following day, the All-Star power forward underwent surgery to repair a partially torn retina in his right eye and won’t be back.
The Suns kept running but, other than O’Neal, had a significant size disadvantage.
Against Dallas, 6-foot-8 Matt Barnes guarded 7-foot Dirk Nowitzki. The Mavericks’ star scored 34 points, 23 in the decisive second half.
“We don’t use Amare as an excuse. We know that he’s not coming back so we have to play with who we have,” Gentry said. “… Rather than cry about Amare not being here, we have to look at our team and say ‘What can we do and what gives us the best chance to win?’ That’s what we’re trying to do.”
Phoenix went 0-4 on an eastern road trip. The losses to Orlando, Miami, Houston and San Antonio were competitive, but in the end, as was the case Tuesday against Dallas, the Suns couldn’t keep their opponent from scoring when it mattered most.
“Where we have problems is that we’re a really undersized team so we struggle with coming up with stops,” Gentry said.
When Gentry decided to double-team Nowitzki late in the game, Nowitzki passed to Jason Kidd, who sank a pair of 3-pointers to clinch the victory.
It’s been that kind of year for Phoenix.
O’Neal has had a resurgent season for the Suns and is a matchup nightmare once he gets the ball in close, but he still struggles to fit into the up-tempo style at times, and he was on the bench down the stretch against Dallas.
Nash said returning to the speed game hasn’t been easy.
“We’ve got a bunch of guys here who didn’t play in Mike’s system,” Nash said. “… We could think about this as the first two weeks of November. We literally brought in a whole bunch of new guys and changed styles after the All-Star break without any practice. I think in some ways that’s a factor in our five losses here that were all winnable.”
em in the West.
So it’s not impossible, just unlikely.
“It’s definitely a character test as to how you compete,” Gentry said. “I think it would be easy now to play the last 18 games out. I don’t see our guys doing that, I really don’t. I’ve been around this team for five years now. I know the core of this team, and I don’t see that happening at all.”
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