Durant decisive with the Suns, Curry bows for his return with the Warriors
Kevin Durant already savior of the Suns with 37 points and a decisive basket. Stephen Curry lost to the Lakers for his first game in a month after his knee injury.
The decisive basket and 37 points scored: for his third game with Phoenix, Kevin Durant disgusted the Mavericks (130-126), Sunday in the NBA, Anthony Davis, guiding, with 39 points, the Lakers to a precious success (113-105) against Golden State and Stephen Curry back.
The opposition was intense in Dallas, between the two teams which were the most active in the last hours of the transfer window, since Kyrie Irving, as “K.D.“, had also made sure to leave Brooklyn, but to form a feared attack duo with Luka Doncic in Texas.
Except that it was the Suns who shone a little more, since Devin Booker was almost as effective as Durant (12/17 on shots, 7 rebounds), with his 36 points and 10 assists (15/25 on shots ). The indecision as to the fate of the match naturally mingled with the suspense in the last moments. And as he knows how to do it one-on-one so well, taking advantage of his superior size to Tim Hardaway Jr, Durant rose at mid-range to give a two-point lead (128-126) at 12.1 second from the buzzer. “No one is ever going to retreat in defense on me. So sometimes I have to deviate my course. There I felt that I was in a good position to put the shot in“, he commented.
In the process, an open double-step was offered to Doncic (34 pts, 9 rebounds), but his ball rolled over the hoop, before coming out, to the great disappointment of the Slovenian, somewhat chambered by Booker. The two stars then approached for a somewhat electric nose-to-nose, without any fuses blowing however. On which Durant, who had put a big screen on his former Nets teammate, Irving (30 pts), a few minutes earlier, finished his work of undermining the last action with two free throws, sealing the third victory of straight from Phoenix, solid 4th in the West.
The Mavericks find themselves 7th, two rows behind the Warriors, defeated at the Lakers, despite the return of Stephen Curry, who had not played since February 4 due to a left knee injury.
The best three-point scorer in history was quite successful, with 27 points and 6 assists to his credit, well supported by Klay Thompson (22 pts). But their combined efforts to try and secure a sixth straight victory were insufficient. Because LA was able to count on a big performance from Anthony Davis (8 rebounds, 6 assists, too), required to make up for the absence of LeBron James (ankle) for at least another three weeks. Here are the Lakers who are approaching 10th place, currently occupied by New Orleans, the last of the play-offs to then hope to hang on to the play-offs.
