Considering Ways to Defend the Suns

After watching the Suns play over the last few years, I'm starting to think that despite their high octane offense, there are some ways to beat them. Here's what I think teams need to do to at least have a chance of winning against them:

Control the Tempo and Exploit Mismatches
As we all know, the Suns want to play a high octane style of ball, it's important that teams who play against the Suns don't fall into the trap of trying to play that style with them. Opposing teams should make a conscious decision to play at a slower pace and pound the ball inside, by taking advantage of mismatches. With many of the line ups the suns play with, there is often going to be a mismatch. Slow the game down, and run your offense through which ever player has a mismatch. If you take your time, play a half court game, and exploit mismatches the Suns will have a hard time trying to get out and run.

Cover Three Point Shooters at All Costs
The Suns don't rely on the free throw line as much as other teams, so they have to get their extra points by nailing tons of threes. It is imperative that you don't leave their three point shooters in order to help out on Nash. That is exactly what the Suns want you to do. Yes, if you single cover Nash, he'll probably go off offensively. But letting Steve Nash get ten extra two point buckets is better than the Suns getting ten three point buckets off of Nash's drive and kicks.

The Lakers took Shawn Marion out of the game and held Amare Stoudemire to a below average game, yet they still lost because Phoenix nailed their threes. Plus Nash's mentality is not to score. He knows the Suns can't win without him getting everyone else involved. A team should take a chance and play Nash one on one. Nash and Barbosa are really their only good one on one players. Almost everyone else thrives on being set up by Nash passes. Let's see how well they play if that option is taken away from them.

The Painted Area blog (via: Forum Blue and Gold) does a good job of explaining how this same strategy allowed the Spurs to beat the Suns on Thursday night:

San Antonio chased the Phoenix shooters off the (three point) line, and forced them into long-jumpers off the dribble. Again, here at the Paint Area we have put forth the concept that you want the Suns taking 2-pointers as much as possible. Give them looks in the 8 foot to 21 foot range as much as possible. Even if you have to sacrifice some easy looks in 2-point range, just get them off the 3pt. line. (The Spurs) did this to perfection. And when the Suns tried to get rolls to the basket off the pick/roll, the Spurs' help on the backline was superb & nearly there every play to either impede Amare, Nash or Marion. The Spurs always seemed to have 2-3 guys waiting in the lane when any Sun tried to attack the rim. Bell & Barbosa were taking mid-range jumpers off the dribble, & Diaw was taking long jumpers–exactly what you want. The Spurs defensive rotations were perfect on basically every possession.

The Spurs contested the Suns on every three point shot and limited them to 2-11 shooting from behind the arch. Compare that to the Lakers, who allowed the Suns to shoot 10-22 from three, and you understand why the Suns scored 115 points against the Lakers and only 85 against the Spurs.

So if you want to beat the Suns, slow the tempo down, exploit match ups, and cover the three point line at all costs.