Suns Focusing on Mental Mishaps Following Game 3 Loss to Mavericks

It's not often the Phoenix Suns are at the hand of their own defeat.

After all, this is the same team that secured the number one seed in the western conference by establishing a new franchise record in wins. The Suns were two mere wins away from winning the NBA Finals last season.

Head coach Monty Williams has turned the tide in Phoenix to the point where the Suns are often expected to win regardless of the opponent.

Yet the playoffs spare nobody, and after Friday's 103-94 loss to the Dallas Mavericks, the Suns could only look in the mirror to find where things went wrong.

Possessing one of the strongest backcourts in the league, the Suns failed to establish any offensive rhythm in Dallas.

You could look at Chris Paul's seven turnovers after two quarters (a career high in the playoffs for turnovers before halftime) or Devin Booker's own mishandling of the ball with five turnovers (and a plus/minus of -12 while on the floor) to understand Phoenix's struggles.

Devin Booker when guarded by Frank Ntilikina this post-season
(total of 17 possessions)

1-8
6 TOs

The next lowest FG% Booker has been held to by a single player was 43%. That player?

Jrue Holiday, in the 2021 Finals. pic.twitter.com/q5lthrmFn9
— William D. Hendrix (@SpecificNY) May 7, 2022

“It’s just turnovers,” Williams told reporters following the game. “You give them 17. And those two, they never have those high turnover games like that. We’d love for those guys to get more (shot) attempts, especially with the minute total they had. It’s something else I have to look at the film and see.”

Williams speaks the truth. Booker, had just five combined turnovers in the previous series against New Orleans and last had five turnovers in a single game on Jan. 8.

“It wasn’t like us,” Booker said following the loss. “You can credit them. They came out, played hard, (and) played desperate. But that’s that. We got a series.”

Dallas, returning home and determined to play inspired basketball after going down 0-2 in the series to Phoenix, made their physicality known from the jump.

Jae Crowder, who scored a team-high 19 points and grabbed seven rebounds, made a comment that the Mavericks simply wanted the win more than the Suns on Friday.

He said, "They played harder, they played more aggressive. I don’t want to say that was what we expected. But at the same time, they got pride. They're at home playing for their season, so they played harder than us tonight and came out with a win.”

Little time exists for the Suns to harp on what could have been a 3-0 lead over Dallas. Now, the Suns are forced to keep a short memory and prepare for another tough 48 minutes on Sunday afternoon.

Phoenix played some of their worst basketball and managed to walk away with a nine-point defeat. The Suns remain confident their mental mishaps from Friday won't turn into habits on the court.

"I think if we take care of the ball, we get more shots at the basket. That’s on me," said Paul. "We ain’t but get up 76 shots and they got 90. That’s a huge difference. We’ll be better on Sunday.”