After a forgettable season in Toronto, Hedo Turkoglu has a fresh start with the Phoenix Suns. (Photo by Mike Schmitz/ValleyoftheSuns)

PHOENIX — New city, new fans, new organization, new coach, new teammates and even a new jersey number.

After a more-than-forgettable season in Toronto, Hedo Turkoglu is finally able to put the Hedo-hate from Raptors fans behind him and turn the page to a new chapter of his career with the Phoenix Suns.

“It’s a new start for me,” Turkoglu said when he was introduced as a member of the Suns on Wednesday. “Like I say, I put [last] year away and it’s a new start for me, a new beginning, so I’m looking forward to it.”

The 6-foot-10, 31-year-old forward was reluctant talk about his 2009-10 season in Toronto, during which he averaged only 11.3 points per game — his lowest since the 2003-04 season.

Turkoglu quickly fell out of favor with the fans and organization, but wouldn’t get into much detail as to why the fit went awry so quickly.

“I really don’t like to talk about the past, I’m always for the future,” he said. “The chemistry wasn’t there on both sides. I guess I wasn’t really used correctly.”

Some say he was out of shape and unmotivated, others say he wasn’t given a chance to showcase his skills. But regardless of the reason for the fallout in Toronto, Turkoglu and the Suns organization alike couldn’t be happier that he’s in Phoenix and expect him to play at the level he did with the Orlando Magic.

“We’re extremely happy to have him here. I think he’s one of those players that can keep us playing at the level that we were at last year,” head coach Alvin Gentry said of Turkoglu. “I think you’ll see a player that will more than likely come back and play at the level he did when he had Orlando on the brink of a championship.”

Turkoglu broke out as a bonafide star in the 2007-08 season when he averaged 19.5 points, 5.7 rebounds and 5.0 assists in his fourth year with the Magic, capturing the NBA’s Most Improved Player award along the way.

He then went on to lead the Magic to the NBA Finals during the 2008-09 season, solidifying himself as a Mr. Fourth Quarter of sorts, drilling big shot after big shot.

“He’s not afraid to take big shots, that’s the first step right there and obviously he’s been very successful making big shots,” Gentry said. “What it does is that it gives us another guy that at the end of games can take the pressure off of Steve Nash.”

Turkoglu’s been a player that the Suns have coveted since 2004 when they almost brought him to Phoenix. He figures to play multiple positions in the Suns’ offense, serve as an alternative ball handler and playmaker next to Nash and drill big shots when they matter most.

But this is a team that is built around chemistry and cohesion. So how will Turkoglu fit with the tight-knit Phoenix Suns?

“We’ve done a lot of homework in that area right there and I think he’ll be fine,” Gentry said when asked that exact question. “He’s a guy that really wants to win. He’s been a winner wherever he’s gone. I think he’s a guy that will fit in well here.”

“I think that I can be a great fit here as a player and a person,” Turkoglu added.

He sounded very willing to make sacrifices to win, whether it be via playing time or shot attempts, and seemed to understand how important chemistry is to this Suns team. He explained that the Magic teams that he was so successful leading were also built around chemistry, and that he wanted to enjoy a strong relationship with the fans and his teammates.

“There’s a good chemistry to build around (Nash) and I can see it. Just diving to the balls, picking up the guys — its all that good chemistry, that’s how you are successful in this league,” Turkoglu explained. “If you look at all of the good teams, besides being just good players they’re good teammates, too. They’re unselfish, they like to play off each other and they like to have fun on the court.

“That’s what we did in Orlando, we were having fun on and off the court. That’s how you really become a good team. Like interacting [with] the fans, having fun on the court. Now that’s what I’m trying to do.”

Turkoglu no longer has to fight off the boos ringing through the Air Canada Centre, or worry about being benched and mistreated by management. He is finally able to rid himself of the Toronto demons and look forward to regaining his reputation as one of the most versatile and clutch players in the NBA.

“Last year — it was last year,” Turkoglu said. “I put that behind me. Now is a new place for me, new beginning, new stuff. … I’m looking forward to having another great year like I had in the past.”

LAS VEGAS — If you were expecting Earl Clark to turn into a bonafide NBA player this summer league, you’ve got to be disappointed about the Louisville product’s first two games.

Clark turned in another mediocre performance in Saturday’s 103-69 thrashing at the hands of the Toronto Raptors, going for 15 points and five boards on 5-for-14 shooting in 22 minutes. The Suns were only -11 in his court time (the rest of the starters were all at least in the negative mid 20s) after he was a team-worst -19 in Friday’s loss to Houston.

Although he attacked the rim more often than he did Friday, Clark still showed a propensity to settle for perimeter jumpers, shots he often clanked. He’s now 9-for-28 (32.1 percent) from the floor through two games. Against summer league defenses.

“Today I had a rough game, just stay positive and tomorrow come out and do the same thing,” Clark said.

Added Summer Suns coach Dan Majerle of Clark: “He’s struggling a little bit. That happens in summer league. He wants to come out and play real well, and he may be pressing a little bit. I don’t know if he’s in the greatest shape possible. He’s a good player, he’s very talented. He’s just got to figure it out, and he will. “

The most distressing point Majerle made has to be the shape thing. Clark even admitted he’s “not in as good of shape as I thought I was.”

It’s OK for him to make mistakes while learning, but when your coach makes a comment about your shape to the media, that’s not a good sign.

I’ll take a more in-depth look at Clark later, but for now it’s disappointing to see him come back as the same player he was last year who couldn’t crack Alvin Gentry’s deep rotation.

The Suns need him to be a rotation guy next season, and the early returns aren’t encouraging.

However, a bad summer league team in which he’s the best player might not be the best place for Clark to showcase his skills. The Suns won’t need him to be their star, they just need him to be a piece who can use his athleticism to wreak havoc defensively and get open enough for Steve Nash to find him for easy buckets.

“Earl’s going to be a role player,” Majerle said. “This is the start of it, and it’s going to be a lot easier for him when he’s playing with guys like Steve and Grant and Jason and those guys. He’s got to be a leader out here not only with his play but how hard he plays. Like I said, maybe he’s pressing a little bit, but he’ll get better.”

Gani impresses in the fourth

After a lackluster first three quarters, Gani Lawal went into beast mode in the fourth quarter.

Lawal scored 10 points in the deciding period (or should I say “fourth” since the game was far from in doubt by then), showcasing a nice spin move that drew a foul and later making a steal and going coast to coast for a dunk.

It was also nice to see him go hard to the finish when seemingly the rest of the team had mailed it in.

“Gani’s going to be good,” Majerle said. “He’s got a long way to go, but he plays really hard, he loves posting up, has got some good, explosive moves. Once he learns the NBA game I think he’s got a chance to be pretty good.”

ESPN’s David Thorpe, who has watched Lawal the last two days, thinks he could be a real find.

“Lawal is a guy that should be in the league a long while,” he tweeted.

Not a good team

As a person so used to the pretty basketball played by Steve Nash’s Suns teams, it’s hard to watch this Summer Suns squad that just isn’t very talented.

The only potential NBA players on this squad really are Clark and Lawal (and it’s hard to say at this point if either will be good NBA players), and the Suns have thus far been overmatched in both games.

They are facing teams with lottery picks and legit NBA players, and it isn’t pretty.

Against the Raptors, the players joining Clark in the starting lineup were -34 (Taylor Griffin), -27 (Matt Janning), -27 (Zabian Dowdell) and -24 (Lawal) in +/-.

Griffin, a player who needed a strong summer to establish himself as a roster player, is 3-for-14 (21.4 percent). He missed four of five threes this afternoon, hardly the stats of a guy hoping to become a perimeter player.

After a solid first game, Dowdell also struggled with a three-point, 1-for-8 shooting performance against the Raptors.

The defense has also been downright Suns-like. The Suns are the only team to yield triple digits in Vegas, and they’ve done it in both games.

Up next

After getting Sunday off, the Suns take on the D-League Select on Monday at 5:30 p.m. MST. It’s hard to say which roster will possess more talent.

Steve Nash has owned the Raptors since rejoining the Suns in 2004, and nothing changed this afternoon when Nash led the Suns past the struggling Raptors. (The Canadian Press/Chris Young)

It is no secret that Steve Nash abuses opposing defenses on the regular, but Captain Canada’s 11-0 record against Toronto since returning to Phoenix coming into today’s game was flat-out ridiculous.

Well, the Suns kicked that Toronto domination up a notch today as they once again defeated Chris Bosh and the Raptors, 113-94.

The Suns haven’t lost to the Raptors since Feb. 10, 2004, and one of the only constants during that stretch is none other than MVSteve.

“I wouldn’t trade (Nash) for any guard in the league,” Alvin Gentry told The Associated Press after the game. “The way we play and what we want to do, he’s my guy.”

Nash proved once again why he should be in consideration for his third MVP, as he helped Phoenix defeat the Raptors for the 12th consecutive time.

Nash and the Suns came out of the gates strong, hitting five of their first eight from beyond the arc and outscoring the Raptors 33-25 through 12 minutes of action.

Jay Triano’s squad continuously switched on Phoenix pick-and-rolls and Nash made them pay with a plethora of dimes to Amare Stoudemire, resulting in nine first-half helpers.

Toronto clamped down in the second quarter, holding the Suns to their lowest-scoring period of the season (17 points). With STAT on the bench in foul trouble and the Suns’ offense struggling, Chris Bosh went into beast mode. The lanky lefty dominated the period, scoring 16 points in the second quarter alone. The Suns had no answer for one of 2010′s most intriguing free agents, who finished the game with 30 points and 17 rebounds.

Thanks to Bosh, the Raptors were only down one going into the second half, but a Suns 28-12 run during the first seven minutes of the third quarter took the air out of the Air Canada Centre.

While Nash was unable to get his offense going in the first half — hitting just one of his first six — he scored 11 points in the third and helped give the Suns a 19-point lead with under four minutes remaining in the quarter.

But Bosh and the Raptors fought back, scoring eight straight points and eventually cutting the Suns’ lead to five with 11:03 left in the fourth quarter. The Suns then answered with a 19-7 run of their own, and Toronto was ultimately unable to claw its way back into the game.

While Nash’s 20 points and 16 assists made this offense go, the other Suns starters filled in the cracks with ease. For the fourth time in the last five games the Suns had six or more players in double figures. J-Rich led the way for the Suns with 22 points — including 4-of-6 from three — to go along with nine caroms. Richardson has now scored 20 or more in his last three games.

Stoudemire was equally as impressive, posting an efficient 18 points and seven rebounds on 8-for-10 shooting. STAT was a non-factor during the second and third quarters but really did some damage late in the fourth when the Suns needed it most.

The Suns became the NBA’s first team to 14 wins today and have proven that their hot start is far from a mirage after matching their franchise-best start through 17 games. This is the most well-balanced Suns team that Phoenix has seen in quite some time, and that offensive attack is paying off in a big way.

To be fair, the Raptors have lost seven of their last 10 games and clearly do not have an answer for the Nash-led Suns. And if anyone not named Bosh would have stepped up for Toronto, this would probably have been a much closer ballgame.

The Raptors came into the game shooting 40.1 percent from three — good for seventh in the league — but they couldn’t get anything to go from distance, finishing the game 1-for-20 (5 percent) from behind the arc. While that most likely won’t happen again this season for Toronto, you have to give some credit to the Suns’ defense.

They did a solid job of running out and getting a hand up, especially for a team that had been allowing opponents to shoot 38.4 percent from three, fourth worst in the NBA.  As Gentry has said all season, this team doesn’t need to be one of the league’s best defensive teams, Phoenix just needs to get the stops necessary to win games, and the Suns did exactly that today.

With the offensive pieces the Suns have in place, it is hard to believe that many teams will slow down this offense. Whenever an opposing defense shuts down a Nash and Amare pick-and-roll, J-Rich or Channing Frye will be wide open for a three. When the defense starts to come out and guard the three-point arc, Nash will dissect the defense and feed a hungry Stoudemire or a slashing Hill.

This team simply has too many weapons to be stifled for 48 minutes of basketball. The starters plus LB combined for 102 of the Suns 113 total points today, but even when the starters struggle, the Suns have proven they have the pieces on the bench to step up and fill the void.

The Suns are the only team to post at least 100 points in every game so far this season, and with so many weapons and such a balanced attack, this offense should remain lethal all year long.

And 1

• Leandro Barbosa sprained his left ankle coming down on Hedo Turkoglu’s foot after releasing a jump shot early in the fourth quarter and will miss at least two games, according to The Arizona Republic. X-rays were negative, but LB estimated this injury could keep him out for as long as two weeks (which would be seven games). Up to that point he was extremely efficient, scoring 17 points in only 15 minutes of play. Suns announcer Scott Williams described LB’s swelling as looking like “elephantitis of the ankle.” Not exactly what Suns fans want to hear.
• Steve Nash is now averaging a career-best and league-best 12.1 assists per game.
• The Suns outrebounded the Raptors 48-44.
• The Suns are now on their third four-game winning streak of the season.
• After a solid performance against Minnesota, Robin Lopez showed a ton of rust with four turnovers in only six minutes. He looked slow, immobile and never really had a chance to get into the flow of the game.

JMZ

Jared Dudley checks in with some more locker room footage in the latest edition of JMZ.

Suns

Raptors

Before their 120-95 win over the Timberwolves, a few Suns were lamenting the cold weather in Minneapolis via Twitter.

It’s not getting any warmer for them as Phoenix heads to the Great White North to take on the mediocre, sub-.500 Toronto Raptors looking for its fourth win in a row, but the Suns aren’t taking this matchup lightly considering the way the Raptors challenged the Suns in Phoenix back on Nov. 15.

“Toronto is a team that gave us fits here,” Suns head coach Alvin Gentry said after Wednesday’s home win over the Grizzlies. “They’re a lot like us in that they have big guys who can shoot the ball.”

By “guys,” Gentry means forward Chris Bosh, who is averaging 25.1 points and 11.9 rebounds per game, as well as center Andrea Bargnani, who is averaging 16.8 points per game and shooting 42 percent from deep. Sound familiar?

While Channing Frye (a.k.a. “Deep Frye” to some Suns fans) is only averaging 12.7 points per game, he is shooting 46.2 percent from three — good enough for 12th in the NBA. With big men hanging around the perimeter, Suns-Raptors games aren’t typically defensive clinics. But that leaves the always-intriguing Bosh-Amare Stoudemire matchup down low.

The Suns have also added another post presence with the return of Robin Lopez, who showed a lot of growth against the Timberwolves (yes, I am cautious, as it was the Timberwolves after all), scoring eight points, grabbing seven boards and notching two blocks in just 15 minutes of action.

As has been the case many times this year, the Suns encounter a team much like themselves. The Raptors are a top-five team in the league in terms of scoring, and the Suns are No. 1.

But while most were expecting an absolute shootout when the two teams met earlier this season, both squads just barely cracked the century mark. The Suns narrowly escaped heartbreak in that game when Hedo Turkoglu’s potential buzzer beater just missed.

It seems like the Suns and other running teams (if we can still call the Suns that), just tend to stifle each other when they match up.

The Suns have beaten the Canadian ballers 11 times in a row, with their last loss coming in February 2004 when Steve Nash was still in Dallas. Nash has always been crucial in these contests against the team from his homeland, dishing 18 assists in last year’s affair in Canada and converting a game-winning three-point play in the final minute of this year’s game in Phoenix.

Nash still leads the league with an average of 11.8 assists per game, his career best. The Suns will likely look to seal this game up early on to get Nash and the rest of the starters some rest before they head to New York to take on former Phoenix head coach Mike D’Antoni’s pitiful Knicks (but let’s be serious, does any Suns fan out there actually pity Mike D.?).

Things get much tougher after that when they head to Cleveland, take on the Kings at home and then face the Lakers and Mavericks on the road. The Suns surely want to take advantage of games against teams such as Toronto and Minnesota, and heading into that stretch, they need to add to the wins column as much as they can.

PHOENIX –- It’s amazing how one shot can make such a difference in how a game is perceived.

Case in point tonight, when the Suns were a Hedo Turkoglu rimmed out shot from bumming about a two-game losing streak.

“If Turkoglu hits that shot we’re in here thinking they stole one,” Jared Dudley said.

Instead the Suns prevailed, 101-100, and they can celebrate being the first NBA team to nine wins with their scorching-hot status and league-best record still intact even after Thursday’s debacle in Los Angeles.

It’s a shame a game as exciting as this one had to come down to one play, but that’s what happened, and who have thought a game between the Suns and Raptors would be won on the defensive end.

The Suns knew the final play would come down to the clutch Turkoglu, so head coach Alvin Gentry subbed Grant Hill in for Amare (Dudley had been playing small forward) so the Suns would be better suited to switch on the screen. After an initial switch put Hill on Turkoglu, the Raptors — correctly figuring the Suns would switch everything — picked Hill with Andrea Bargnani to put Frye on Hedo for the final shot.

Turkoglu, who had previously drilled a pair of clutch buckets in the final minutes, lost the ball momentarily to give Frye a split second extra to get up on him; he then just clanked a step-back jumper from 20 feet out. If you watch the replay, you can see an irate Gentry screaming at the official about a double dribble call, but in the end it didn’t matter with the Suns walking off victorious.

“Bargnani was going to go to the corner to space out and let Hedo do what Hedo does, and then I think he saw I was the biggest guy on the court,” Frye said. “Smart move, so you get me out, get us to switch and take your chances. He probably was like, biggest guy on the court, me, go out there and play some D.

“Last year I would have never seen the court at the end of the game and this year I made the game-winning stop, so hey, you never know what’s going to happen.”

The resilient Suns locked up the Raptors earlier in the quarter to put themselves in position for the victory, holding Toronto to 39.1 percent shooting in the fourth and running out to a 14-2 spurt after the Raptors went up seven early in the period.

It was a real nail-biting finish when Turkoglu hit a pair of jumpers to put Toronto up two, only to see Nash take what the defense gave him on a pick-and-roll by driving in and hitting a left-handed layup and drawing a foul for his eighth career game-winning shot and second this season.

“It was the way it had to be tonight,” said Nash, who went for 23 and nine. “We had to grind it out. We struggled a little bit offensively tonight, so we had to find a different way to win, and I think a big part of our start has been that we’ve won a number of games at the defensive end.

“I just tried to be aggressive (on the winning possession), and I found a seam. … We just weren’t flying offensively tonight, and luckily we had that toughness to find the stops down the stretch.”

Frye continued his red hot start at US Airways Center, drilling another six three-pointers in this one, including a critical one to put Phoenix up three with just over two minutes left. He has now hit six three-pointers in three of his first four Suns home games, and he’s hit more triples in his first four games at home than he had knocked down in his first four seasons as a pro.

He’s the only NBA player to hit six big shots three times thus far, and only New York’s Danilo Gallinari and J-Rich have done it twice. In all there have only been 13 such performances in the early going.

What’s even crazier is Frye’s home-road splits. He’s hit 65.6 percent of his threes at home (21-for-32) but just 30.6 percent on the road (11-for-36) in seven contests away from Phoenix.

“It feels good to be home,” said Frye, who scored 20 points and took eight of his nine shots from distance. “I made junk on the road. I was just calm out there, just remembered to get some legs into it and just breathed out and enjoyed myself. I was having fun out there, (and) it was a good situation. Go figure.”

The Suns also got a big game from Amare Stoudemire a day before his 27th birthday. A game after his career-worst shooting performance in Los Angeles, Amare pounded the Raptors for a season-high 30 points on 10-for-15 shooting from the field and 10-for-11 shooting from the line to go with eight boards (four offensive).

His output largely had to do with the way Toronto played the Suns. Pretty much any time the Suns ran a pick-and-roll (which was a lot), the Raptors would switch. This meant a big was covering Nash and a small Amare.

The Raptors tried to swarm Amare in the paint to recover, but as can be seen from his stat line, more often than not Stoudemire was able to convert or draw a shooting foul.

“We took advantage of the smaller guys in the paint,” Amare said. “I think the guys played phenomenal basketball out there seeing the mismatch.”

However, Amare largely dodged the question of whether he needed a bounce back game like this after his 2-for-15 stinker in Los Angeles, instead saying the team needed a bounce back performance.

After a 33-31 first quarter led by the Raptors in which the Suns shot 61.9 percent and Toronto 57.7 percent, the shooting percentages dipped quite a bit for these mirror image teams, and anybody who bet the under on this one went home with a wad of cash.

In the end though the Suns showed the mental toughness to get the final two stops and subsequently their 11th straight win over the Raptors.

“I like our toughness, our grittiness,” Nash said. “Not physically but mentally we find a way to hang in there and we scrap and find a way to win close games.”

I just wonder what Nash and his mates would be saying if Turkoglu’s shot rolled in.

And 1

• Jared Dudley, what can you say about him. Again his line won’t do him justice, but there’s a reason Gentry could not take him out in the fourth quarter, first leaving him in for Frye to play the four against Bosh and then Hill. “I’ll say it again. You look at his line, he’s 1-for-4, he has five rebounds, but you just can’t read anything into what Jared Dudley means for our team and what he does. You guys have watched him, you know how important he is for us. He’s instrumental in everything we do here.”
• With the win, the Suns took over sole possession of first place in the NBA. They also became just the sixth team in Suns history to open a season 9-2 — the 2004-05 and 2007-08 squads did so as well — and they ran their home winning streak to 13 games dating back to March 12. They have now also scored at least 100 points in 30 straight home games dating back to last year and every game home or away this season.
• Frye on what made the Raptors so tough to handle at the defensive end: “Playing our type of basketball, being unselfish, hitting the open guy, they were hitting threes, spreading us out. I know, right? Just doing the things we’re used to doing.”
• Goran Dragic did not play in the second half and logged a season-low five minutes in his first scoreless game of the year. Dragic didn’t record a rebound or assist either but turned the ball over twice and picked up a foul. Sounds like a Dragic line from last season, not this year.
• Jason Richardson scored just eight points but grabbed 10 rebounds (nine defensive).
• The bench scored just 14 points in this one and for once the Suns’ scoring wasn’t balanced, with Amare, Nash and Channing combining for 73 of their 101 points (72.3 percent) and nobody else scoring in double figures.

Raptors

Suns

If you’re a fan of old school, grind-it-out basketball, don’t even turn on tonight’s Suns-Raptors game. But if you prefer arena basketball and points galore, man you’re in for a fun one.

What the Raptors have done in the early going this season is actually quite difficult to accomplish: they lead the NBA in offensive efficiency (113.7 points per 100 possessions) and rank dead last in defensive efficiency (yielding 112.5 pp100).

Are we sure Mike D’Antoni isn’t secretly coaching this squad from New York?

By comparison, the Suns are downright balanced, ranking third in offensive efficiency (110.9 pp100) and No. 22 in defensive efficiency (107.0 pp100). The Suns still lead the league in true shooting percentage (58.4 percent) with the Raps right on their heels in second at 58.2 percent.

First one to 120 wins? Or should I say 130?

The Raptors are being molded by Bryan Colangelo, who of course was the architect of the 2004-05 Suns squad that many feel the current version of the Suns resemble.

“This team is a lot like us,” Suns head coach Alvin Gentry told The Arizona Republic. “It’s almost a mirror image of what we are. … They do a lot of the things we do.”

The Raptors have a superstar big with an elite inside-outside game in Chris Bosh playing the Amare role, a three-point shooting big in Andrea Bargnani playing Channing Frye’s role, a playmaking small forward in Hedo Turkoglu resembling Grant Hill and a point guard in Jose Calderon who is the closest thing this squad has to Steve Nash, although that of course is a ridiculous comparison.

We all know Bosh is a stud, but Bargnani has got to be the biggest surprise of the early going for Toronto. The former No. 1 overall pick increased his scoring output from 10.2 points per game to 15.4 ppg last season, and he’s increased that in a big way in the early going this year to 19.6 ppg.

Andrea (still sounds weird calling an NBA center that) is attempting five threes a game and hitting 46.7 percent of them, knocking them down at a better clip than Channing (43.3 percent).

If they end up matching up it will be really interesting to see how they handle each other. Both players generally have a huge advantage going up against a big unaccustomed to guarding an opponent with three-point range. Although both guys are prolific long range bombers themselves, they still don’t guard too many guys like each other. Theoretically, though, they both have the agility to defend the three.

The Amare-Bosh matchup will be intriguing as well, especially for those around the league looking ahead to the Summer of 2010. For years it seems there’s been a lot of talk around who’s the best 2010 big man, and in this one both guys have a chance to prove their point.

All in all, the Suns have won their past 10 meetings against Toronto, their longest active win streak against one team, and have averaged 118.2 points per game during that stretch. The Raptors last won in Phoenix in February 2004 when Nash was still a Maverick.

The betting line in Vegas for this over-under is right now set at 232. If I were a betting man, I’d have to go with the over.

The Suns have never seen THIS Shaq on their side, and boy, did they ever need him. (AP/Aaron J. Latham)

With Steve Nash missing another game, everyone knew Shaq needed to step up.  Nobody thought he’d step up like this.

Shaq went off – to the tune of 45 points, 11 rebounds, three steals, and a block, while only missing five of his 25 shots from the field. With only Chris Bosh as a legitimate big man, it was clear early on the Raptors had no answer for the Big Cactus.

Shaq’s dominance led to a 133-113 victory for the Suns, their first ever win with both Nash and Amar’e Stoudemire out of the lineup since Nash returned to Phoenix in 2004.

“It was cool. Guys were really looking for me and I’ve been saying all year if I can get those touches like that I can do it every night,” Shaq told Suns.com. “I’ve been doing it on a consistent basis for 17 years and they were looking for me tonight.

“It was good that we figured out a way to get stops – offense has really never been a problem for us – we just have to find a way to get stops.”

Of course, Grant Hill’s double-double (14 points, 12 assists) and Louis Amundson’s best game of the year by far (20 points, 10 rebounds, four assists) helped a lot.

“I’ve had a few games where I wasn’t as confident as I could have been, but I got off to a good start tonight and Shaq was drawing so much attention that I was just cutting in there and finishing shots,” Amundson told Suns.com.

Shaq turns 37 next week and hadn’t had a 40-point game since 2004. But more importantly than a monster game, the Suns played one of those games where you sit back and think, “Man, if they can make the playoffs, avoid the Lakers in the first round, and get Amar’e back on time, they’ve got a chance to do something.”

They proved once again that even without Amar’e they can outrebound teams of equal or smaller size nightly, collecting two more boards than Toronto.  They also proved that without him they can continue to score 90 points in the paint.  They held the Raptors to just 36.

But it wasn’t all happy-happy-joy-joy in the Purple Palace.  Right before the half, the Suns suffered a total defensive breakdown and saw their 12-point lead dwindle to just one in just over a minute before the half. The Raptors scored 11 in 1:06.

“We’ll take it, it was a good win,” head coach Alvin Gentry told Suns.com. ”We needed a win any kind of way we can get it. I thought we played well, but I was a little disappointed in the way that we finished the half. We took a couple of tough shots, and then we lost a couple people in defensive assignments. We went from 12 or 14 points right down to one, so that wasn’t very good.”

It was quite an exciting first half, though, that included Jason Richardson flying into the second row at half court, followed by Shaq doing what he seems to be doing almost weekly now by tumbling into about the sixth row. Hopefully nobody was hurt because it sure looked like some poor guy took a J-Rich shoe to the dome, and some poor blonde appeared to get whiplash when the Suns’ 325-pound center came crashing down on her. 

Grant Hill also had an electrifying dunk in the first half that really made you wonder how old he really is.

The Raptors played well in the third, only to have their momentum sucked away right at the beginning of the fourth quarter when Bosh picked up his fifth foul.

“The first play of the fourth quarter typified it,” Toronto head coach Jay Triano told Suns.com. “They made a hard cut to the lane and Chris Bosh picks up his fifth foul. That’s when we kind of lost our momentum.”

Of course the other storyline coming into the game was Shawn Marion returning again to the Valley after doing so earlier this year as a victorious member of the Miami Heat.  The Matrix finished with 27 points, 11 rebounds and three steals.

“It was cool,” Marion told Suns.com. “It’s always nice to come back here. This is where it all started. It would’ve been nice to get another win though.”

This contest was as close as you can get to a must-win for the Suns, who open a dreadful stretch of games Sunday at home against the Lakers. 

Gentry called the game “winnable” on Thursday, and they really needed to pull this one out since after the Lakers the team goes on the road to face Orlando, Miami, Houston, and San Antonio before coming home to face Dallas and Cleveland.  With Dallas’ overtime win against Oklahoma City, the Suns are still two games out of a playoff spot heading into Saturday.

Nash carved up the Raptors with his pinpoint passing. (AP/The Canadian Press, Nathan Denette)

If the Toronto Raptors had any kind of interest in Steve Nash before Sunday’s masterpiece, I wonder what they’re thinking now.

Nash dished a season-high 18 assists to lead the Suns to a 117-113 victory in Toronto that featured ball movement galore thanks to him. The Suns assisted on about two-thirds of their baskets, while the Raptors did so on only about half.

It was vintage Nash, as he whirled his way through the lane to find open teammates, tossed alley-oops, hit teammates in stride for threes and did everything he could to help the Suns offensively except score before turning on his own offense late.

He even turned the ball over just twice for a 9:1 assist:turnover ratio, and what coach wouldn’t take that?

At one point in the game Nash featured a bizarre stat line of just two points to go with 15 assists, before five free throws and a tough driving layup that put the Suns up three with 12 seconds left him with nine points for the contest.

“I just didn’t need to (score), just trying to find my teammates,” Nash told Suns.com. “If it’s working like that, I’m happy to sacrifice for my teammates to get them up. I’m happy to get my teammates involved.”

That’s the beauty of Steve Nash.

Nash was the star of the game despite scoring in single figures while six of his teammates reached the double-digit mark, including a 31-point effort from Amare Stoudemire.

But the reason his teammates were so effective in this one is because Nash was finding them, creating opportunities and giving them the ball in the right spot at the right time.

That’s what Nash has always done during this tenure in Phoenix, and Nash is the reason this particular Suns club is such a cohesive offensive unit (not to mention the last four).

Except for some rumblings at the beginning of the season when the offense had yet to find itself, we haven’t heard a ton of complaining from the “STAT”-conscious Amare Stoudemire. Next to Amare in the paint is a Big Diesel who likes to run his mouth about what he can do when given consistent touches whenever he has a big game, but Shaq has not become an issue either.

Then enter Jason Richardson, a guy used to scoring 20 per game and jacking up shots whenever he wants to after playing for bad Golden State and Charlotte teams most of his career, but we haven’t heard a peep out of him about wanting the ball more.

There’s also a point a minute (and sometimes shot a minute) sixth man in Leandro Barbosa, a former All-Star in Grant Hill and a solid contributor in Matt Barnes needing shots. And they all get them because of Nash.

Teams in the past have tried to let Nash score to beat them because when Nash is on his passing game like this the Suns’ offense is a flat-out juggernaut.

Phoenix scored 71 points in the first half and for the game shot 54.4 percent. The Suns always seemed to get a clean look because Nash was looking out for his teammates not himself. That is until the final play, when the Canadian was clutch with the tough layup.

“He sacrifices,” Shaq told Suns.com. “He sacrifices himself 1000 percent of the time. He doesn’t really take bad shots or he doesn’t really force shots, he is always looking for guys, sometimes when they are not even open.

“I know that he has sacrificed a little bit of his game for me this year, just throwing the ball in the post a lot. The true definition of a true great player is if you make your teammates better, and he has definitely made me better this year.”

Added head coach Terry Porter, “He has still been our MVP this year and really doing everything that we need him to get done.”

It’s kind of funny to hear Shaq utter such remarks in light of his disapproval of Nash’s MVP awards over the Big Diesel. But it seems like whenever a player gets the opportunity to play with Nash, they change their tune.

The bench was huge as well with Barbosa and Barnes combining for 30, and the Suns are such a better team when they get such contributions from their bench.

Both Barbosa and Barnes have a tendency to go hot and cold, but when they’re rolling this is really a deep and dangerous Phoenix Suns team.

It was also important to start the six-game roadie on the right foot, especially after those two past excruciating losses that Phoenix should have won. Aside from Monday night’s game in Boston, the Suns really should win every one of these, but when teams leave their coast there’s always the chance they fall flat on their face.

Toronto’s no slouch by any means, and a three-game losing streak with a trip to Boston on the docket would have really stung.

The Suns don’t have to worry about that in large part due to the contributions of Nash, who also dished 18 assists last year in Canada and clearly enjoys playing in his home country.

When faced with the inevitable questions about playing for the home nation team one day, Nash termed such a return “a dream come true in a lot of ways.”

That ought to make any Suns fan feel a bit queasy, especially in light of Sunday’s performance, but I bet we’ll hear a similar answer from Nash on Wednesday when the New York media takes a crack at him.

We all know Nash may be heading to Toronto or New York in a year and a half, and such a breakup may even be in the Suns’ best interests depending on what direction Phoenix plans to go in during the summer of 2010, but for now Suns fans should enjoy watching their two-time MVP pick apart defenses as much as his teammates enjoy playing with him.