3 Goals Suns Have to Accomplish Before Playoffs

The Suns had two key players return from knee injuries in their 125-123 loss to the Denver Nuggets Tuesday in Grayson Allen and Royce O'Neale, but are still battling several notable injuries, just as they have all season.

Dillon Brooks (left hand fracture) has missed the last 17 games, and Mark Williams (left foot third metatarsal stress reaction) has been out for the last 12, although both could be returning at some point next week, according to Arizona Sports' John Gambadoro.

Haywood Highsmith (right knee injury management) and Amir Coffey (left ankle sprain) have also missed the last few games, so it would be nice for the Suns to have their entire complement of players to see what they look like fully healthy, which has not happened almost all season long.

Devin Booker, Jalen Green and Brooks have only shared the floor together for 41 minutes total this season due to injuries all three have faced.

Ideally, the Suns can build some kind of continuity when Brooks and Williams return, even if only for a few games, and not deal with any more injuries before their play-in matchup.

Phoenix has rolled out plenty of different rotations all season long and has seen several players have career seasons or break out at some point when their opportunity arises, so the Suns have to figure out exactly how they plan to trim the rotation down heading into the play-in if they can finally return to full health.

2. Build Momentum Going Into Play-In

Even though they seem destined for the play-in, these nine remaining games are very important for the Suns to try to get back to their winning ways.

Phoenix has blown fourth-quarter leads in five of its last six losses, so the Suns need to get over this hump and try to build some momentum going into the play-in.

Going back to the first goal, the Suns can afford to have injured players rest a little longer because of the position they put themselves in (not battling for a top-six spot), but need to find a way to have things clicking, which ideally would also mean full health, by the time the play-in starts.

The Suns can do this by handling the remaining teams on their schedule with losing records especially after an embarrassing loss to the Milwaukee Bucks last Saturday, but have three games left against Western Conference playoff teams in the Houston Rockets (April 7), Los Angeles Lakers (April 10) and Oklahoma City Thunder (April 12) that could do a lot for their confidence if they were able to pull out victories.

One specific area the Suns can focus on in this time is generating turnovers and getting points off of them, as they rank 15th in opponent turnovers and 13th in points off turnovers since the All-Star break (18 games) after starting off the season very well in these areas.

3. Win Opening Play-In Game, Prove You Belong in First Round

As it stands now, the Suns would host the No. 8 Los Angeles Clippers (37-36) in the first play-in matchup, then the winner would advance to play the No. 2 San Antonio Spurs (55-18) in the opening round of the playoffs.

The loser would play the winner of the 9-10 matchup, which would currently be between the Portland Trail Blazers (37-37) and Golden State Warriors (35-38), and the winner of this game would go on to make the playoffs and play the No. 1 Oklahoma City Thunder (57-16).

No matter what the scenario ends up being, the Suns first of all, cannot fall below the seventh seed, but the goal then should be to take care of business in the play-in and prove they belong in their first-round series.

This season is only the first one of this Suns group, and they have already exceeded all preseason expectations, but the next step for the future would be establishing themselves in the postseason and then seeing exactly what changes need to be made in the offseason to continue to build off it.

Even if Phoenix doesn't win its opening playoff series, taking it to six or seven games with every one being competitive, would be a huge positive and stepping stone for the future, although an upset all together would put everyone on notice about the job owner Mat Ishbia and coach Jordan Ott have done to turn this team around so quickly.

In order to do this, the Suns have to take the rest of the season one game at a time, build momentum, get healthy and then hope this sets the stage for them winning their first play-in game.

From there, the destiny of this season is in their hands.