TNT's Kenny Smith gives Phoenix Suns 'incomplete' grade coming out of NBA All-Star break
INDIANAPOLIS – TNT NBA analyst Kenny Smith compared the Phoenix Suns led by their Big 3 of Devin Booker, Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal to his academia at the University of North Carolina.
“I used to have a lot of these in college, incompletes,” a laughing Smith said last week. “I’d start the class and drop it. So I had a couple of those, man, I think this is an incomplete kind of situation because we’ve seen them play together, but we haven’t seen them tested. I’m not really sure when they’re tested, what are they going to do defensively and what are they doing to do offensively yet.”
Smith and fellow TNT NBA analyst Candace Parker shared thoughts on the state of the Suns (33-22), who come out of the All-Star break fifth in the West. Having won 14 of their last 18 games, Phoenix plays Thursday at Dallas (32-23) in the first of a back-to-back that concludes Friday at Houston (24-30).
“I just look at them as an incomplete grade," Smith continued. "That’s a team you have to pay attention to second half (of the season). Kevin Durant always gives you a chance regardless of where he’s been. We’re not even talking about Booker and Beal. We’re just talking about Kevin Durant in generality. That grade is still incomplete, man. They’ve got to come to more classes.”
The Suns are 14-8 with their Big 3 in the lineup, but Beal missed Phoenix’s last game against Detroit with a left hamstring injury suffered in the first quarter of a win over Sacramento the night before.
Beal was scheduled for a nose procedure during the break after it was broken in last month’s loss at Indiana. He’s been wearing a mask in his last nine games.
Fourth quarter woes
The Suns are ninth in the NBA in offensive rating, and 14th in defensive rating, but have had their share of struggles in the fourth quarter. They’re 14-15 in clutch time, which is defined as the final five minutes of the fourth quarter or overtime in a game within five points.
“The thing that’s most surprising to me has been they’ve had these leads going into the fourth quarter,” Parker said last week. “I think they’re going to figure it out in the second half of the season.”
Phoenix is last in the NBA in total points scored in the fourth quarter (1,361) and points per game in the fourth (24.7). The Suns are giving up 28.2 points in the fourth on average, 1,551 points total.
They are even further on the negative side when it comes to turnovers in the game’s final 12 minutes.
Phoenix last in turnover average in the fourth at 4.1, making it the only NBA team that’s committing more than four a game in the quarter. As a result, the Suns are also last in points allowed off turnovers at 5.6. No other NBA team is surrendering more than 4.5 in the fourth off turnovers.
“If you look at some of these games, especially on this East Coast trip that they took a couple of weeks ago, there were so many games they went into the fourth with leads and they lost,” Parker continued.
'Who do you feature?'
The Suns went 4-3 on the two-week road trip, but they were outscored in the fourth quarter of the last six, which they wound up splitting. The low point of that stretch came in a 113-98 loss at Orlando. The Magic outscored the Suns, 31-13, in the fourth. Phoenix shot just 27.8% from the field (1-of-3 from 3) and turned the ball over seven times with Beal committing three.
“I think a lot has to do with trying to figure it out,” Parker continued. “Who do you feature? Who has the ball? Who is creating plays? Who is a playmaker? The ball is in Book’s hands a lot orchestrating the offense, but where is the balance of him scoring and looking for his shot? That’s where a lot of the turnovers in the fourth quarter, not getting the good offensive possessions that you expect from three of the best scorers in the NBA.”
Suns coach Frank Vogel is preaching make the extra pass as they have three players outside of the Big 3 who can knock down 3s in Grayson Allen, Eric Gordon and Royce O’Neale, who the Suns acquired from in a three-team deal right before the trade deadline.
Allen leads the league in 3-point shooting percentage at 48.2%, Gordon is at 38.8% while O’Neale has started fast from deep in his first three games with the Suns at 6-of-13. On the season, he’s at 39%.
Durant is eighth in the league on 3s at 44.3%, Booker is hitting 37.9% of his 3s and Beal is at 36.3%. However, the offense turns to iso ball with Booker, Durant or Beal. This allows three of the game’s best scorers to go do what they do, but the offense becomes stagnant at times and doesn’t get quality looks.
“They’ll figure it out in the second half of the season and start winning some of those games that they lost mid-season,” Parker said.
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3 games vs. Houston; who rules West?
Phoenix has an interesting schedule coming out of the break.
After the road back-to-back against the Mavericks and Rockets, the Suns face the Lakers (30-26) at home Sunday in a 1:30 p.m. game. They then don’t play again until Feb. 29 against Houston.
Two days after that, the Suns take on the Rockets again. So, Phoenix plays Houston three times in their next five games.
The Timberwolves (39-16) are atop the West, leading Oklahoma City (37-17) by 1½ games, the Clippers (36-17) by two and the defending NBA champion Nuggets (36-19) by three. The Suns trail Denver by three games.
“We’ve been saying the Clippers have that ability to be that team to come out the West,” Smith said.
Kawhi Leonard and Paul George have been healthy as both were voted in as All-Stars. The Clippers are 33-15 since acquiring James Harden from Philadelphia in a trade and are getting solid contributions from their bench starting with Russell Westbrook, but Smith’s belief in them begins with head coach Ty Lue. The Suns are 0-2 against the Clippers so far this season.
“That was my whole thing every year,” Smith said. “Tyronn Lue is probably the most underrated coach in basketball. I think his ability to get his team to play at maximum potential. I never watch a from Ty Lue and go, ‘Man, they’re an underachieving team, man they didn’t play as well as they should have.’ I never say that. That’s the overriding factor, Tyronn Lue.”
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'Haven't seen them swim in the ocean'
As for the T-Wolves and Thunder, they are unproven in terms of recent postseason experience and success, and are led by relatively young stars.
Minnesota’s All-Star duo of Anthony Edwards and Karl-Anthony Towns are 22 and 28 years old respectively while OKC All-Star stater Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and 7-footer Chet Holmgren are 25 and 21 years old.
“It’s different swimming in the pool than swimming in the ocean,” Smith said. “These guys are swimming in pools and they’re great swimmers in the pool. We just haven’t seen them swim in the ocean and it’s a little different current. It’s hard to evaluate them because you don’t know how they’re going to respond to that you’re down 3-1 in a series, and you’re saying, ‘OK, that doesn’t mean anything. We can come back.’ There are special people that can do that and there’s a special mentality that you have to have to be down 2-1, be down 3-1 and still feel like you can win the series and that’s where the ocean comes in that we haven’t seen them in.”
Minnesota has only been to the playoffs three times since the 2017-18 season and was eliminated in the first round on those three occasions.
The T-Wolves have reached the postseason the last two years, but they fell to the Grizzles in 2022 and the Nuggets in 2023. They last advanced past the opening round way back in 2004 when reaching the Western Conference finals and losing to the Shaquille O’Neal-Kobe Bryant Lakers.
That was the last time Minnesota made the playoffs before returning in 2018.
“We just haven’t seen them perform in that environment yet,” continued Smith about the T-Wolves and Thunder. “And don’t forget just about the ocean, and it’s raining.”
OKC hasn’t made the playoffs the last three seasons, but it did get a victory in the play-in over New Orleans before losing to Minnesota for the eighth and final playoff seed in the West last season.
The Thunder’s last four playoff appearances have ended in first-round exits. They last advanced past the first round in 2016 when reaching the Western Conference finals and losing to Golden State in seven.
That was Durant’s last season in Oklahoma City.
“It’s so interesting because I feel like OKC, especially Minnesota, caught everybody by surprise,” Parker said. “What has surprised me most about their two young stars is their ability to play on both sides of the ball. In the playoffs, young players, you don’t play defense until six, seven years in the league. You decide, OK, winning time. I think it is their defense that has surprised me the most, which I think is sustainable in the playoffs.”
As a team, the Thunder are 17th in defensive rating while the T-Wolves rank 20th.
“We’re forgetting Denver, the defending champs,” Parker said. “All four (T-Wolves, Thunder, Clippers, Nuggets) were tied (recently). I think if you are going to be a young team, and as Kenny said, you are going from the pool to the ocean, you’ve got to make sure you’re doing that at home and you’re not doing it on the road. If there’s anything, finish out the regular season, it’s extremely beneficial to get homecourt advantage because playing in Denver is a doozy and everybody knows that.”
Parker wonders how OKC or Minnesota would fare playing say the Suns in the opening round. That would most likely have to be a 4-5 for that matchup to happen in the first round.
“It’s going to be interesting down the stretch how important that ends up being,” Parker added.
Have opinions about the current state of the Suns? Reach Suns Insider Duane Rankin at dmrankin@gannett.com or contact him at 480-787-1240. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, at @DuaneRankin.
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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Kenny Smith assesses Phoenix Suns coming out of NBA All-Star break
