You can stick a fork in this season, it's over. The players aren't going to pretend that any playoff hope still live as the team lost its third game in four tries. The Suns vow to keep fighting and to be professional but there's no denying reality and this team is a lot of things, but delusional isn't one of them.
"It feels like it's over, just because we haven't played as well or won games so it's disappointing, but it's been disappointing all season," Steve Nash said after the game.
Nash, who is worn down and banged up at this point in the season -- as he's been at this point in the last three or four seasons -- couldn't find his shot tonight. He went 3-11 and had just six points but still managed to record 10 assists on a night when his team only shot 42.5 percent.
As a team, the Suns had a horrible shooting night from the field. They went just 1-16 from the three-point line. The one three point shot, credited to Vince Carter, is the fewest the team has made all season. Three times they had just three, threes in a game.
Add to that just 14-23 (.609) from the free throw line and the Suns gave themselves little chance even though the Mavericks, who played last night in Utah, were also cold. Dallas shot just 38.1 percent and thanks to solid defense from Grant Hill, Dirk Nowitzki went 6-19 on the night.
While coach Alvin Gentry was proud of his team's effort and will stick with his new starting lineup, there's no getting over the fact that this season is going to end in disappointment.
For Nash, the blame falls on the lack of continuity on the roster. Asked about his feelings on the new lineup that has Jared Dudley and Marcin Gortat starting, Nash answered with a comment about theme of the season.
"Well, you're damned if you do, damned if you don't. We start this lineup and we have a good first quarter but then we don't have Marcin coming off the bench or Jared (Dudley) coming off the bench.
"We're a team that's had so much change this year that I don't think we know where we are yet. We're still trying to learn who we are with all the new pieces. We have five guys left from last year. It's been hard to really get on a roll or momentum without commonality."
The Mavericks were led by three players with 16 points each: Jason Terry off the bench, along with Jason Kidd and Tyson Chandler.
The Suns fall to 36-36 on the season with just 10 games remaining for this lottery-bound team.