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Phoenix Suns are doubling down on '80s connections, while 2000s connections are lacking

With Steve Nash heading to Golden State while the Suns play their annual intrasquad scrimmage at their original home, Veterans Memorial Coliseum, it's obvious which memories the Suns want to reprise.

By Geoff Allen

I love me some Madhouse on McDowell!

With the announcement of the Phoenix Suns playing their annual intrasquad scrimmage at Veterans Memorial Coliseum this year - rather than the Walkup Skydome in Flagstaff - we can see just a little more evidence of the Suns' attempts to increase their link to prior generations of Suns fans.

Jeff Hornacek. Mark West. Alvan Adams. Eddie Johnson. Tom Chambers. All still with the Suns organization nearly 30 years after they made their name as Suns on that court in downtown Phoenix.

Those Suns teams made two Western Conference Finals before leaving for America West Arena in 1992.

I love it. So many older Suns fans will eat this up, while the younger ones can appreciate the history if not connect with it directly.

At the same time, Golden State is creating SSOL Suns West, with head coach Steve Kerr, president Rick Welts, and a handful of other mid-2000s Suns in their organization.

You know, the organization that just won the NBA Championship playing the best possible version of SSOL, with defense and all.

Now, Steve Nash joins the fold in Golden State.

So basically, it appears that Nash will do something similar in Golden State to what Jeff Hornacek did with Utah to get into the coaching and player development area.

But hey, at least the Suns have Nash's Ring of Honor induction ceremony coming up. Too bad they didn't schedule for the night Golden State visits, so a lot of his professional friends could be there too.

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