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After losing a third straight game to drop to 8-8 this season, a frustrated Chris Paul has spoken bluntly about the current state of the Phoenix Suns – they need to play better.
“We’re not…” Paul began, stopping briefly, “playing well enough at the moment. I’m not going to say that we are not good enough, but we are not playing well enough at the moment.”
The Suns lost 102-97 at home Wednesday to Paul’s former team, the Oklahoma City Thunder, with the last three minutes going bad for Phoenix. The Thunder finished 11-2 with the Suns missing their last six shots.
Paul, who led the Thunder to a surprising 5-seeded streak last season behind brilliant play with clutch time, scored a season-high 32 points in 35 minutes against OKC. But two sharp looks in the final 20 seconds didn’t fall, the first being a midrange turnaround that spun off the rim, and the second a potential equalizer straight away 3 that drew all the air.
The Suns have been without All-Star guard Devin Booker for the past two games due to hamstring pain. Although the team missed their scoring ability, coach Monty Williams refused to recognize this, or anything else, as an excuse.
“Until this team understands consistency for four quarters, we’re going to feel that a lot,” said Williams. “We can try to make everyone feel sorry for us. It won’t work. We have to be consistent. It’s on us.”
Williams, clearly aggravated by his availability after the two-minute game, insisted on the Suns’ need for consistency.
“In the home stretch we had an incredibly poor finish,” he said. “We have open shots, missed shots under the basket. It’s just mediocre. Poor execution and poor finish. That’s it.
“At some point, you just have to finish games and understand what it takes to be a great team is consistency,” said Williams. “Period. That’s the deal.”
Williams has made it known that if we were going to ask him a question from that point on, he would respond the same: consistency.
“Whatever you ask me, I’m going to say ‘consistency’,” Williams said. “That’s all.”
The Suns were leading by 15 at the end of the first quarter. But with botched turnovers and a stagnant offense, they scored just 10 points in the second quarter, prompting a 21-4 OKC run to take the lead towards the break.
As Paul tends to do, he quietly settles into the game, postponing early but asserting himself late. He scored 13 points in the fourth quarter to give the Suns a late lead, but defensive lapses and poor offensive possessions led to the downfall of Phoenix.
“We play in spurts,” said Paul. “We have to respect who we play. Every night. Respect the opponent. They get paid like us.”
For Paul and the Suns, a promising start to the season has slipped over the past three weeks. The addition of Paul had seemed to help maintain the momentum they had built with their unbeaten bubble run, but a disruption to their season with a three-game hiatus from health and safety protocols and then Booker’s injury. , interrupted him.
The Suns have lost five of their last six games, with just about all recent losses being tight calls – back-to-back overtime games against the Denver Nuggets not going their way, a four-point loss to the Memphis Grizzlies and five-point loss to OKC.
“I’m just trying to figure out how we can win,” said Paul. “Because lost stuff gets old.”
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