Suns Coach Frank Vogel Reacts to Loss vs Nuggets
PHOENIX -- The Phoenix Suns weren't quite successful in their preseason home debut, falling to the Denver Nuggets in 115-107 fashion on Tuesday night.
The Suns didn't feature any of the likes of Devin Booker, Kevin Durant or Bradley Beal after they had previously played on Sunday in Detroit.
Instead, the Suns trotted out a starting lineup of Josh Okogie, Chimezie Metu, Jusuf Nurkic, Grayson Allen and Saben Lee while the Nuggets rolled out most of their starters in Phoenix.
After the game, Suns head coach Frank Vogel reacted to the loss:
Video: Suns Coach Frank Vogel Reacts to Loss vs Nuggets
(On assessing the defense and the expectation of it…)
“Well, definitely not there, but definitely picking things up too. It’s a new system, defensive system and this team in particular creates a lot of different challenges that…we have complex layers to our defense. We’re still in our base defense phase, so we walked through some of the coverages this morning and just asked guys to compete even though they’re new.”
(On Grayson Allen and Josh Okogie’s performance tonight without Kevin Durant, Bradley Beal and Devin Booker…)
“Those guys are capable ball handlers, Grayson (Allen) in particular, showing me something offensively, especially when those guys are out, he can really carry the load for us. When he is on the backside, with those guys scoring, he can really give us a different dynamic and J.O. (Josh Okogie) as well. Shooting the ball with confidence from the perimeter, but also attacking and his ability to use the space that those three create to attack the basket. He’s an exceptional driver, so both of those guys are going to really help offensively.”
(On Josh Okogie’s decision-making on when to attack the basket vs. when to move the ball around…)
“I think he’s got a good feel of when to do it and when not to do it. We want to get as many shots for (Bradley) Beal, (Devin) Booker, and (Kevin) Durant as we can, but when those guys are out or the defense is hung up on those guys, he’s going to have the green light to be in attack mode and utilize that space to attack the basket and obviously with those three guys out, everyone had to be a little more aggressive.”
(On Jusuf Nurkic defending Nikola Jokic tonight…)
“Pretty good. We got crossed up on some of the (Nikola) Jokic and (Jamal) Murray switches that we wanted to do and where we want to switch. We have precise rules on that type of stuff and we got crossed up on some of that, but I thought on the ball, he really competed against Jokic and what I really liked is that we were able to go back at him on the other end. I think he drew two fouls on him, on post-ups, and played the power post-game, which is not a ‘Jokic thing’, it’s an ‘opponent’s best player’ thing. We always want to make the opponents best player defend on the other end, however that looks, and I thought Jusuf (Nurkic) did a great job of that.”
The Suns continue their preseason schedule tomorrow in Portland.
