FINISH. Leandro Babosa, you must start finishing at the rim. (You too, Diaw. But I can't kill you after you scored 60 whatever in two games on the road.) And Phoenix (as D'Antoni just said on TNT) missed about 5 WIDE open threes in a row coming down the stretch. That said, I thought, contra D'Antoni, that Diop made a pretty big difference - a lot of those misses at the rim were because he was a presence. Yes Diaw scored a bit, again. But Diop was able to clog the middle a bit more so that Phoenix didn't destroy them with pick and roll after pick and roll.
Also, the switch from Harris to Diop forced Dallas to slow down, meaning Phoenix had to produce all of their own momentum - they weren't quite as quick tonight as they were on Wednesday. I'm not sure it was fatigue, but the ball seemed to stay out of bounds just that half-count longer. It probably also helped that the Mavs did a better job getting back (but see again the slower pace, which enforced better floor balance, aiding transition D)
Naturally the injury issues massively favored Dallas. Bell was out (and Barbosa gave them very, very little) Josh Howard doesn't have the "Jimmy Leg" as Kramer would say, he's got a "Jimmy Body." And if he can knock down j's all series, very bad news for the suns.
Both teams can be reasonably confident (though the Suns having taken a game on the road are certainly happier with the outcomes), as each team has played one game at their prefferred pace, but the other team can honestly feel like they coulda/shoulda won.
As a final note, the thing where Nash presses his non-dribbling hand against his chest (wiping his hand off?) really annoys me, and I'm not sure why...
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