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Nobody believes Devin Booker meant to bank in this game-winner
When the Phoenix Suns needed a big bucket in the closing seconds of the fourth quarter, everyone at Golden 1 Center knew where they were going.
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Shooting guard Devin Booker had shaken off an iffy first half to catch fire, and after Sacramento Kings point man Darren Collison hit a 15-footer to tie the game at 103-all with eight ticks left, the Suns came out of a timeout with a chance to exit with a rare road win. They put the ball in the hands of their 20-year-old flamethrower and let him go to work:
Booker isolated on veteran swingman Matt Barnes on the left wing, ball-faked, took one quick step and hard dribble to his right, and rose up. Barnes recovered to contest, getting his hand right up in the youngblood’s face, but it didn’t matter; just after the fourth-quarter buzzer sounded, the ball banked off the backboard and splashed through the net, giving the Suns a dramatic 105-103 win.
The bank-shot capped a big night for Booker, who scored 26 of his game-high 33 points after halftime to help Phoenix snap a five-game losing streak overall and a four-game skid against the Kings.
“I know Matt Barnes is a really good defender and I saw he was on me coming out of the timeout,” Booker said after the game, according to The Associated Press. “I didn’t want to do too much with the ball and I wanted it to be our last shot. I knew it wasn’t a great look, but it went in.”
“Wasn’t a great look” might be an understatement in this case, which might help explain why Booker’s chuck caught glass before getting what some might call a fortuitous bounce on its way to paydirt. Or, at least, that sure seems to be what his teammates and the opposing coach thought. From Doug Haller of azcentral.com:
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As they dressed in the locker room the only question was simple: Did Booker mean to bank in the game-winner?
“Hell, no,” center Tyson Chandler said.
“I don’t give a damn what he tells anybody in here,” forward P.J. Tucker said. “That boy was not trying to go glass.” […]
“Guy took a contested 20-footer,” Sacramento coach Dave Joerger said of Booker’s final shot. “I don’t know how he [made it]. Only he’ll tell if he went off the glass or not on purpose.”
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So, Devin: how about it? Did you call glass, or nah?
“I don’t have to answer that,” Booker said with a smile, according to the AP.
Sometimes, no answer is a pretty clear answer.
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Dan Devine is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at devine@yahoo-inc.com or follow him on Twitter!
