5 takeaways from a huge Phoenix Suns win over the Boston Celtics

The Bench…Ouch

It wasn’t all gumdrops and rainbows Saturday night in Boston for the Phoenix Suns. The general trend of the night went something like this:

The starters get out to a big lead, the bench lets the Celtics back in it, the starters regain the big lead, the bench lets them back in it. It is close at the end.

In fact, if you remove Rubio and Okobo from this list considering their odd rotation, Phoenix starters averaged a +/- of +16.5 and the bench, -13.3.

To be fair, it was a short bench. Cameron Johnson was out with a quad contusion and Tyler Johnson was out with an inability to play high-level basketball anymore.

Moreover, Frank Kaminsky still has weeks to go considering this patella stress fracture, and yeah, they really miss his bench scoring.

Of course, the guy who typically come off the bench, Mikal Bridges, went off with the starters, so really the Suns only played eight guys last night with limited and at times, cringe-worthy minutes for Ty Jerome and Cheick Diallo.

Regardless of the circumstance, getting Devin Booker some help, especially scoring help while he is on the bench, will be key for this team moving forward.

Speaking of moving forward: