As the Sonics learned with the arrival of each game in January, you can’t call a timeout on a season spiraling out of control. And as Wally Szczerbiak learned with 15.1 seconds left in last night’s game, you can’t call a timeout when your team doesn’t have any. Channel Z’s error cost the team a technical foul and a shot at winning the game–they were down only one to the Phoenix Suns and had the ball when he made it. They ended up losing 103-99.

Wally’s gaffe obscured a solid effort by the Supes, who kept pace with the Suns from buzzer to buzzer (it helped that small forward extraordinaire Shawn Marion had departed and Shaquille O’Neal not yet arrived–and let’s not forget that it was the also-traded Marcus Banks who killed the Sonics in the teams’ first meeting this year).

Notable performances:

-It looks like Weezy is back to his early season form, knocking out a 22 and 15 double-double in a dunk happy battle with Amare Stoudemire (and the rest of the Phoenix front line). This is his 5th double-double in the last six games–and it’s worth noting that the Supes have won four of those.

-Earl Watson brought a little Steve Lavin-era UCLA flavor with a between the legs, no look pass to Chris Wilcox for the fast break dunk.

-While struggling mightily from the floor, Johan Petro continued to provide energy and shot-blocking off the bench, grabbing seven boards and erasing three shots in 22 minutes.

-Jeff Green hit another three-pointer, making him 4-25 on triples for the season, but 3 for his last 4. Sure, it could be just random statistical variation, but it’d be nice to think that all his work on his shot is paying off.

-Despite a bad night shooting, Kevin Durant had a solid fourth quarter, scoring five consecutive points to get the Supes back into striking distance and showing off his emerging defensive prowess in harassing Steve Nash into a key fourth quarter turnover.

I was talking with a friend the other day about overseas professional soccer and how the bad teams get bumped down to a lower league. At least the Sonics are starting to look like a team that shouldn’t be bumped down.

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 9th, 2008 at 11:09 am and is filed under Supersonics, Roundball. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.