Suns Vs. Cavs reaction: Phoenix shows toughness and resolve

SB Nation's Phoenix Suns blog, Bright Side Of The Sun, reacts to the team's historic comeback against the Cleveland Cavaliers on Friday

Have The Suns Found Their Next Great Bench Scorer?

As a team made up collectively of 15 individuals you are not going to solve all of your plights overnight, or even in six games despite what some other teams think. That explains why this team is even for the season in terms of wins and losses so far. What the Phoenix Suns have been able to do is chip away at those quandaries as the season progresses.

One glaring issue coming into the season was the team's lack of a punch off the bench, offensively.

When evaluating the bench coming into the season the likes of Sebastian Telfair, Shannon Brown, P.J. Tucker, Markieff Morris, Jermaine O'Neal, Wesley Johnson, and Kendall Marshall was a group not identified by scoring, but more by defense, youth, inexperience, and energy. That is very odd to the casual fan as Telfair, Brown, and O'Neal made their names for different respective reasons as offensive players.

Overall the team still lacks a traditional play-maker off of the bench, but Brown has taken over the role as the teams' go-to scorer off of the pine. In three losses this season Brown scored just 10.6 points per and shot 34.4% from the field both respectable, but neither worth of discussion as a great bench player. Two of those games were close for the most part and the shots were just not falling for Brown as the Suns lost.

"I have always been a scorer. I didn't get into this league because of nothing else," said Brown about his impressive run as of late. "But as far as working myself up I try to get better every day, every summer, every season, and be a student of the game. I try to contribute to this team in any way, it just so happens that I am scoring points."

That scoring prowess is something this team sorely needs as they have lacked a true sixth man that can come in, and when needed, close out games for the team.

In that sense Leandro Barbosa was the last great Suns Sixth Man and that was four years ago when he was coming off of the bench for the team scoring 15.4 points per game as the Brazilian Blur.

Right now Brown does not have a cool nickname to boast his scoring ability or even the mindset of the teams closer.

"You call it whatever you want to, I am a basketball player. The other day I hit six threes they asked me if I was a three point shooter I said no I just make threes."

When you do what Brown has been doing in the fourth quarters this season especially in wins the talk is going to come. Like scoring 10 points to ward off the Pistons, or nail six threes against the Bobcats, and putting your team on you back during a 26 point comeback with 12 points in the final period is going to garner some recognition and Brown is going to get called a lot of things. A lot of very positive things.

Danny Manning, Rodney Rogers, and Barbosa have all won Sixth Man Awards while other greats like Joe Johnson (started off as a reserve), Tony Delk, Rex Chapman, Cedric Ceballos, Dan Majerle, and Mike Sanders have played the part for the Suns over the years. It is a tradition here that the team has that one, go-to player, off of the bench when the team needs it.

Brown does not want to be called a closer or a three-point shooter which is fine, because right now he has done each in three games, not in six, but he is proving he is one heck of a basketball player that is key to the Suns winning basketball games.

If he finds consistency like the Blur did then the Suns may have found another diamond that four other NBA teams could not find in the rough. Another journeyman if you will that is only hitting his stride now, seven years into his career, and with his fifth team.

Suns Make History In A Major Comeback Win

It was a historic win for the Phoenix Suns as they rallied back from being down 26 points in the second quarter to pull off the exhilarating 107-105 win over the Cleveland Cavaliers. Early in the second quarter the 42-16 deficit seemed insurmountable, but head coach Alvin Gentry apparently delivered a whale of a halftime speech.

"There was not a PG version of what I said at halftime," said Gentry after the game.

That speech inspired a defensive effort that was unbelievable to see as they forced eight turnovers that led to 14 fast break points in the second half, defense leading into offense. The defense was spearheaded by the play of Goran Dragic and his ball pressure full-court against great young athletes like Kyrie Irving and Dion Waiters as he almost played himself to being literally physically sick.

"I don't know about right now, but I feel really really good," said Dragic after the game about his fatigue in the second half. "I almost threw up. I am still young so I will be ok."

The adrenaline was really flowing for the team after the game and it was hard to put a performance like this into words. Falling behind like this is not something the team can do with consistency, but rather they need to put together a full four quarters to win games.

Gentry preached that after the game:

"In this league you really do have to play the whole 48 minutes. We have been there where we are up 14 and then we are down 16. My whole thing was don't have long faces and everyone has to lift each other up. We have to truly believe we can do this, chip away, chip away, and find an opportunity in the final three minutes. You have to believe that. In the end we got it done, but I don't want the long faces I want us to believe that when we get ourselves in trouble we can bail ourselves out with getting stops and not just by trading baskets."

This was a major win and a historical one in the end, something that Dragic has grown accustom to in a Phoenix Suns uniform over the years. He knows that the team cannot fall behind like this consistently and even joked about it after the game.

"We won by two points?" asked Dragic. "Maybe we could have fallen behind 27 then."

Suns Vs. Cavs game recap: Phoenix rides late run to 107-105 win at home

Goran Dragic led all scorers with 26 points as the Suns mounted a furious comeback to defeat the Cavs at home.

Suns Vs. Cavaliers Preview: Starting Line-Ups, Coaches Take, Key Match-Ups

Two pretty evenly matched team in terms of personnel, record, and general young inconsistency meet up trying to get there season back at even through six games. For the Suns this is a nice barometer in terms of where they are as a team.

Suns Vs. Cavs: Fans might not get to see who Suns promised to draft

Dion Waiters reportedly was told by the Suns that they would draft him. He plays for Cleveland but might miss the game on Friday.

NBA schedule 2012: The weekend features two games for the Phoenix Suns

The Suns will have two tough games against the up-and-coming Cavaliers and the rugged Jazz this weekend.