Gerald Green was being Gerald after the game - blunt and candid.
"I don't know I guess it was just one of those days," Green said. "I never really thought that we were going to lose this game. It's just kind of surprising for us. I think everybody in that locker room was kind of shocked...we never really thought that we were going to lose this game."
Coach Hornacek was blunt after the game: his team did not show up to play hard against the Magic.
"Orlando - they played hard for 48 minutes," coach said after the game. "You've got to give them credit. We played hard for about 12 minutes in the game; that was about it. We want to continually go through the motions and think that we're just going to beat teams, not get dirty and not get hit and get scratched up, whatever it takes."
Goran Dragic said the same.
"We didn't play like we were supposed to," he said. "I think most of the game our effort was not there. They got all of the 50-50 balls and all of the boards and for us it was really tough to score."
More from Hornacek:
- "We're getting into an offense, and they were just switching it. We were indecisive on making a hard move. To get it inside, we were kind of hesitant to get it in there. They were fronting and their defender was sitting in the lane, and we just ran into him so that you couldn't get an illegal defense call. So we were just trying to keep him...in one stretch I just told them, ‘Don't flash because you're coming right to him. If you just stay out wide where you don't come to him, he can't touch you. They're illegal defenses.' But then our guards, you get a big guy and no one can get around anybody. I guess to their credit, (Nikola) Vucevic, (Tobias) Harris and (Kyle) O'Quinn, they were able to keep us in front and our guys when you saw (Victor) Oladipo and Elfrid Payton, they just crossed over and went on us."
- "Again, I think sometimes when you have the purpose that you're going to try to score, then that's when you get in trouble because all you see is the ground, all you see is the defender while you're making your moves. But if you drive with the purpose of, ‘Hey, I got a big guy on me. If I go by him, somebody else is going to be there and you know that. You know that prior to your drive, so you're going to kick it out."
Give some credit to the Magic, who played hard the entire game. They broke a 4-game losing streak and now are 5-7 on the road a year after going 4-37 on the road. They put in the effort.
Magic coach Jacque Vaughn:
- "I told the guys afterwards that they decided the result of that game. They didn't leave it in the hands of anyone else they were competing against; a very good effort for us. To rebound the way we did and an overall great effort from the group."
- "I think overall we had a great emphasis on getting the ball under control and that was done by our smalls that took on that challenge and our bigs who supported in pick and roll coverage. We did a really good job of being locked into the game plan. That was our game plan. To have all those threes contested, contested at the rim. You saw activity level from us, especially in that first half: deflections, getting our hands on balls. Maybe Nik didn't get the rebound but tipping it out to a teammate to control. A collective group effort from these guys."
There you have it, folks.
On the plus side:
- Markieff Morris had a very good game: 18 points, 10 rebounds, 7 assists
- Goran Dragic had 22 points, 4 assists and 8 rebounds
- The Suns are still in 8th place in the West and have a winning record entering December
The Suns are shocked they lost this game. They now seem to have a collective assumption that wins are coming.
The Suns committed a flagrant foul (2 free throws and the ball) and two technicals (2 free throws) and lost by 3. You can't play dumb and lazy and expect to win.