The Phoenix Suns had perhaps their most impressive win of the season on Monday, as they went to Los Angeles and outworked a fully healthy Lakers roster en route to a 125-108 win. To do so without Grayson Allen, a late scratch through illness, was even more impressive.
Spectre of Tyus Jones finally put out by Collin Gillespie.
Point guard Collin Gillespie once again got the nod to start for the Suns, and he was awesome throughout. Head coach Jordan Ott also splitting the time he and Devin Booker spent on the court before the latter exited the game with an apparent groin injury, to ensure one of them was always out there creating for their teammates.
The sight of Gillespie picking up full-court to annoy Luka Doncic was a complete departure from what they had last season, when Tyus Jones had a massively underwhelming campaign. Jones is long gone and now plays for the Orlando Magic, but this was the game that made the Suns realize they should have turned the page on that experiment much sooner.
How frustrating must it have been for Gillespie to toil away in the G League and watch Jones fail to take the opportunity given to him. When he himself was promoted to the main roster throughout last season, he was a spark even on a roster that featured Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal.
A career night for Collin Gillespie 👌 pic.twitter.com/cCD6D3Eoex
— Phoenix Suns (@Suns) December 2, 2025
Gillespie is simply the much better defender and his shooting has been off the charts so far in 2025-26. His ability to constantly get defenders off their feet before sliding to the side for a 3-point effort has been one of the Suns' most underrated weapons offensively.
In the victory he was a brilliant 10-of-19 from the field, including a sizzling 8-of-14 from deep, and kept popping up with timely baskets as the Suns pulled away. On the season he is averaging a shade under 43 percent on 3-pointers, which is much closer to teammate Allen in that department than anybody could have reasonably expected.
That's not to say Jones is not a smart player, he remains a player who can create for others and get his own shot off the back of the space he creates, but we didn't see that in Phoenix. In fact we're barely seeing it with the Magic this season as he has fallen down their pecking order.
The numbers for Jones don't look half bad when you look back, 10.2 points the third highest mark of his career while he shot 41.4 percent from deep on five attempts per game. His 5.3 assists were the second highest mark of his career too.
But there's a reason we recently named Gillespie the Suns' MVP of the first-quarter of the season, and he is simply doing so much more on both ends of the court that doesn't always show up in the box score.
They're leading the league in steals per game and remain above average defensively (just about), but this win has steadied the ship. Had the Suns turned to Gillespie full-time last season, who knows how much he could have powered that group to some extra wins.
The playoffs were still likely out of reach, but there's no question they would have played harder each night with Gillespie at the point of attack. He remains one of the finds of the season across the whole league, and against the Lakers emphatically ended the memories of Tyus Jones in The Valley.