Suns star Kevin Durant was left embarrassed after Phoenix was humiliatingly eliminated at home for the second straight season.
Phoenix’s season came to a halting end Thursday night with a 125-100 loss to the Denver Nuggets in Game 6 of the Western Conference semifinals.
The 25-point defeat was eerily similar to a similar crushing series loss last season after the Dallas Mavericks dominated Game 7 at Footprint Center in the same round.
Thursday night’s humiliation drew loud boos from the crowd at halftime and many flooded towards the exit with plenty of time remaining in the fourth quarter.
Durant, who was drafted midseason in a move that made the Suns one of the favorites to win the NBA Championship, insisted the team could build on the loss, despite admitting the experience was ’embarrassing.’
Suns star Kevin Durant was left embarrassed after Phoenix was humiliatingly eliminated
Phoenix’s season came to a halting end Thursday night with a 125-100 loss to the Nuggets
‘It sucked,’ said the former MVP, via ESPN, following Thursday’s loss. ‘It was a bad feeling. Embarrassing.’
He added: ‘We just got to be better next year. It’s hard right now to see what the future will hold for our team, but we got a good foundation, good infrastructure.
‘We can build on and move on from this and learn from it and get better from it. I’m sure as the summer and offseason starts, we’ll figure that out a little bit more.’
Durant, who only managed eight regular-season games for the Suns due to injury, also said he didn’t want to ‘provide context’ that could be perceived as an excuse.
Phoenix was without starters Chris Paul and Deandre Ayton through injury as it became the third team in NBA history to be eliminated from the playoffs in consecutive seasons with 25-plus-point losses.
Meanwhile, Durant’s fellow star teammate and face of the organization Devin Booker made a swift exit, leaving the arena without speaking to the media.
Suns coach Monty Williams admitted that it was a ‘bad feeling’ to have been eliminated in humbling fashion in consecutive years.
However, he claimed that both years were two different scenarios and downplayed the link between them.
Devin Booker (left) made a swift exit, leaving the arena without speaking to the media
Suns head coach Monty Williams (right with Booker) admitted that it was a ‘bad feeling’
‘I mean, it’s two different groups,’ Williams said. ‘Last year’s team was totally different than this year’s team.
‘Last year’s team was more of a ball-movement, body-movement team. This year we’re more pick-and-roll oriented and iso-oriented, so it’s two different situations altogether.
‘That’s something that we need to take a look at to see what kinds of combinations of players we have to fit the style of play. But it’s hard to make assessments about those kinds of things 20 minutes after a loss.’
Durant had some good moments in the playoffs, but made just one of his first 10 shots on Thursday as the Suns fell into a huge hole.
Guard Booker was brilliant in most of the postseason, averaging 36 points per game on 60 percent before Game 6. But the three-time All-Star finished with just 12 points on Thursday.
Meanwhile, Nikola Jokic scored 32 points in another triple-double to help the Denver Nuggets advance to the finals.
Source: dailymail.co.uk
