With toughness and big time production from what had been an underachieving bench, the revived Suns head back to L.A. tied at 2, very much alive

SCOTT JACOBS

The Phoenix Suns waited three grueling games to see their much ballyhooed bench finally produce.

On Tuesday, their bench did more than that.  They outplayed the Lakers… starters, and set a rambunxious, title-starved Suns fan base into pure delirium, after another 9 point victory.  And just like that this series has shifted from a finger food for the LA-Boston finals series that everyone had already confirmed was inevitable to a good ol’ western shootout.

Suns 2.  Lakers 2.

The party’s just getting started people.

Written off for dead heading back to Phoenix, the Suns head back to Los Angeles with a plane full of confidence, and the belief that not only can they compete with the purple and gold, but that they can win this series.

It’s almost comical that defense, in particular the Suns zone defense could become the story of a series that has seen the winner rack up 110+ points in every game, but Phoenix’s defense in the fourth quarter of a raucous game four was the story.  The Suns stifled the Lakers usually fluid triangle offense, forcing the Lakers into long threes from guys who simply were not making them.

The bench which played exceptional was the catalyst, but it was Channing Frye who gets the game ball.

Frye, teetering on the edge of playoff infamy, was well on his way to the worst shooting dry-spell in post-season history when he finally hit a three in the second quarter.  The crowd went ballistic.  It got the Suns potent offense flying off the handle en route to a 41 point quarter.  A 9 point half time lead.

Frye tacked on a few more huge threes, finishing with 14 points, but the emotional lift he gave the Suns was enormous.  With no hesitation Frye kept chucking ‘em up, and finally they started falling.  With the Suns second nine point win in three days, maybe the analysts that supposedly had this series pegged will shut up too.

It’s not that the Suns beat the ‘mighty’ defending champs back to back.  It’s the way they did it.  On Sunday it was through a superhero-esque performance from Amare Stoudemire and a phenomenol game from Steve Nash.  On Tuesday it was all about the reserves, as the stars of Phoenix’s unexpected playoff ride took a backseat to the men usually taking a seat as the game wanes into the final minutes.

But there they were, Nash and Stoudemire, getting pulled from the scorer’s table as Goran Dragic, Leandro Barbos, Louis Amundson, Jarded Dudley, and Frye shot L.A. out of the game.  A closely contested game that was tied going into the fourth.

The moral to the story?

It’s not just the zone defense which totally took the Lakers out of their offense.  It’s not just the bench play and the resurgence of Frye.  It’s not just Stoudemire finally going right at Pau Gasol and proving to the world, you cannot stop me.  It was all of it.  The Suns still missed a lot of threes, but once again they wanted it more.  Richardson jumped into the crowd going after a loose ball.  Stoudemire wrestled the Lakers bigs for a ball underneath the basket.  Nash even took another shot to the face.

And afterwards the Suns hardly looked like the shell-shocked unit that was ‘too small’ to play with the tall trees from Tinsel Town.  Instead they looked like the defending champs, hitting clutch shots all over the floor.

The Suns have waited 42 years to bring a title to Phoenix.

Turning this series into a best of three is one heck of a start.

There won’t be any L.A.-Boston columns today.  The Lakers are no longer a sure bet.

The Suns made sure of that on Tuesday night.

Photo: Reuters

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