In a surprising performance that would have surprised no one just a few months ago, the Phoenix Suns’ defense lost its edge in the first half of Tuesday’s 127-121 loss to the Miami Heat.
One of Phoenix’s worst defensive outings of the season came across a first half it lost 71-54, boosted by a matchup that favors the Heat.
That’s when the expected response arrived, a 38-21 Suns third quarter to tie the game going into the fourth. A wacky run of possessions that included a Dillon Brooks technical got the game in a chaotic zone, something we’ve mentioned in this space previously that is a “for better or for worse” situation for the Suns this year.
In the middle of all that chaos, Devin Booker went to contest an alley-oop pass in transition and landed by twisting his left ankle. He got up quickly to hobble back to the locker room late in the third quarter, which is always the tell-tale sign for Booker that he’s legitimately hurt, as opposed to numerous times he will tweak something in a game and hardly show signs of it.
Booker returned to the bench, working with elastic bands to keep his left ankle in an OK spot before checking back in, not losing any time on the floor because of the injury. He did appear to aggravate the ankle in the closing moments of the game, though, so the injury report on Wednesday afternoon will be top of mind.
While that bench-watching was going on, the Suns’ bench unit continued their latest key push forward with three 3s to put them in the lead early in the fourth quarter.
The chaos ensued from there and it’s never going to be controllable.
Miami’s Bam Adebayo, who came into the night in one of the worst slumps of his career, continued his flow from the first half with 13 of his 29 points in the fourth quarter, including three deep jumpers in the span of just over 90 seconds.
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The Suns (24-16) were producing enough counters, thanks particularly to Mark Williams, but two brutal defensive possessions with the game tied at 116 sealed their fate at 1:25 remaining. Booker lost track of Norman Powell before Powell made a cut for an open midrange jumper, and then Grayson Allen allowed far too easy of a driving lane that forced everyone to help toward the paint, so Powell got an open corner 3.
Phoenix was then down three, and on the ensuing inbound, Allen stepped out of bounds while catching the ball.
A Williams rejection on a floater for Miami’s attempt to put the game away gave Phoenix more life, only for a mad-dash of a scrambling possession resulting in two iffy looks from 3 that did not go down. The second attempt was by Brooks, and he earned a flagrant foul for his effort that was pretty ridiculous even by his standards, sealing the game’s conclusion.
The Heat (21-19) joined the Suns as one of the league’s darlings about six weeks into the season, and the highest of optimists were going as far as saying Miami was revolutionizing modern offense with its strict limit on ball-screen actions for a new approach at spacing. But instead, it has given torpedo bats energy.
Miami since Dec. 3 had a record of 6-12 coming into Tuesday, largely due to being dead last in offensive rating. Opponents figured it out, and especially with Tyler Herro’s return, the Heat are now going back to running more pick-and-roll.
That also benefits their franchise player in Adebayo, who entered the day averaging 11.4 points per game in his last 11 contests. An inconsistent player at times, Adebayo is also clearly being negatively affected by the adjustments to the adjustment.
Phoenix has been a top-five defense over those same six weeks, so this figured to be the easiest of stylistic mismatches to take advantage of.
There were two issues with that.
One, the Suns have been prone to defensive breakdowns more consistently over this time period, which honestly makes it more impressive how strong their defensive metrics are.
If there was a way to measure lockdown possessions, the Suns probably had more than anyone besides Oklahoma City over that span to make up for that, as well as the usual generation of turnovers. That evening out process got lost a bit on Tuesday.
The other problem is Phoenix’s weakness has always been on-ball defense, and with how persistent Miami can be with downhill pressure inside its unique system, that’s actually the stylistic mismatch. Jordan Goodwin is really the only perimeter guy that grades better than above average in that category but the Suns overcome that because the rest of those guys bust their ass, are smart team defenders and stay connected on the proverbial “string.”
So, when the string has some missing links, it can all fall apart pretty quickly.
In addition, Miami’s got a handful of big and strong wings that had no problem powering through that resistance and shooting over it.
Back-to-back drives by a Miami ball-handler directly through a Suns defender for a finish near the rim put the Heat up 16 a few minutes into the second quarter. At that point, Miami was shooting 12 for 13 at the basket, per Cleaning the Glass.
The effects get multiplied when the Suns are missing shots often and quickly, which allows Miami to get inside the paint easier playing off misses before the defense is set.
That second quarter was one of the most jarring stints of this Suns season, because it doesn’t come to mind a moment when they were clearly manhandled in the physicality department. The Heat finished 25 for 29 at the rim.
The first half ended with a 17-point deficit, a figure dug deeper by the fact that second-chance points were 9-5 Miami and points off turnovers went 10-7 Heat. Phoenix only forced five giveaways in the opening two quarters.
All this plus what we know about how the Suns respond to major deficits set up an obvious surge coming out of halftime, and it was just a matter of how Miami would handle it.
The answer was poorly!
The Suns began the third quarter up 20-7, including a 13-0 spurt in 2:25 that got them within four. The defensive activity ticked up drastically, mostly on the smaller things like closeouts, rotations and rebounding. That led to the Heat’s shot-making taking a severe dip as well.
The Brooks technical foul came shortly after, his 14th of the season.
While he followed-through a bit with his arms in the act of drawing a shooting foul, it came nowhere close to warranting that call. Brooks, however, is racking these up partially due to his reputation. He has said it and he’s right. He’s also got to be much, much better about not giving the officials a reason to assign him one.
If this one isn’t rescinded, he’s two games away from a suspension, but even more damaging is how a dead Miami crowd suddenly got heavily engaged into the game around that mid-third quarter mark. Again, that is when the Heat started collapsing and when the crowd should have actually started to quiet down.
That was all a part of the chaos that was the Suns’ friend until it wasn’t.
Allen has been in great form since coming back from injury. He scored 25 points off the bench and has to be getting back his starting spot any game now.
Brooks also had 25 on an 11-of-24 shooting night that included a 1-for-10 mark from deep. Booker shot 6 for 19 for 24 points with nine rebounds, nine assists and four turnovers in 40 minutes.
Williams finished with 18 points and 14 rebounds in easily his best performance of the last few weeks.
Points off turnovers finished 24-18 Suns but they still only forced a dozen turnovers. A 18-9 offensive rebounding advantage fueled by Williams had second-chance points end at 20-18 Suns.
Jalen Green (right hamstring strain) remained out as his three-week re-evaluation timeline passed on Monday. Head coach Jordan Ott told reporters pregame Green will not play on Thursday in Detroit, either.
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