The Phoenix Suns continue their surge up the Western Conference standings, thanks to seven straight wins that has seen them climb all the way up to fifth. With a 26-18 record and Kevin Durant just named as a starter in this year’s All-Star game, the organization has put a difficult start to this campaign behind them.
It was not so long ago that Bradley Beal couldn’t stay healthy, most of the bench players weren’t really helping and the Suns were in danger of falling out of the play-in positions out West. A lot of their recent turnaround is rightly attributed to Durant, Beal and Devin Booker, but there’s more to it than that.
If you’ve been paying attention, then you will know that center Jusuf Nurkic continues to be everything and more for this Suns group.
What a first half of the season it has been for the 29-year-old. Although Durant was rightly named the franchise’s MVP of the first 41 games played, the fact Nurkic was even on the list of players at all (third, behind Grayson Allen) is a development few, if anybody, saw coming this season.
It goes beyond availability as well, although that has helped Nurkic’s cause massively. The knock on him has never really been what he can do on the court. Yes he was shipped out of Denver in favor of Nikola Jokic, but so would any other big man in Nurkic’s position. While with the Portland Trail Blazers, they simply didn’t have the depth of talent around Damian Lillard to get the best out of Nurkic.
Add to that the fact he missed a lot of games for his former team, and expectations were modest when the Suns decided to make the massive decision to trade Deandre Ayton for Nurkic last summer. Yet he has played and started all 42 games he has appeared in so far this season, upping his minutes on the court from 26.8 last season, to 27.8 this time out.
This might not seem like much, but to not only play basically every night – but also spend even more time on the court than last season – has been a huge win for this Suns team. Head coach Frank Vogel has also gotten the best out of Nurkic’s limited abilities on the defensive end, while offensively the fit has gone as well as expected.
