Despite Sweep, Suns Gained Respect From NBA Champs

PHOENIX — The Phoenix Suns' season is over.

It wasn't quite a glorious ending after being swept out of the first round of NBA playoff action, though coming at the hands of the Oklahoma City Thunder, such is life for any team – let alone a Suns squad that wasn't expected to be there to begin with.

The Suns were a fun story throughout the 2025-26 season, and even after not putting a dent in the series record, the defending NBA champions (who very much are expected to do so again) said Phoenix earned their respect.

"I want to acknowledge Phoenix and congratulate them on a great year," Thunder head coach Mark Daigneault said after Game 4.

"Just saw Mike Muscala on the court, and it reminded me he was such a huge part of our build early on. There's just a few people that were a huge part of that that weren't here for the last couple of years to see kind of the fruits of that labor, but he's certainly one of them. Happy to see him coaching, he's a great man, he's going to have a great career in coaching. Congrats to him on his first season. Then congrats to Phoenix, their team, great fight in the series.

"They were down some guys, but they're highly competitive team. I have tremendous respect for Jordan Ott and the job that he did in his first season, the discipline and organization on both sides of the ball was impressive. So, congrats to them on a really good year in a hard-fought series"

Phoenix snuck into the playoffs as the play-in tournament's seventh seed and ultimately played the West's top team in OKC. The Suns were practically in their last three games through the middle stages of the fourth quarter, which doesn't count much on the actual scoreboard.

Yet in the realm of assessment and building moving forward, Chet Holmgren gave the Suns props.

“No matter what happened, not being rattled by the last possession. They're a good team. They made runs. The games were competitive," he said after the sweep. "They're well coached. They gave us different looks, threw different things at us, and we adjusted well, stuck together, and stayed confident in our stuff and made enough plays.”

The Suns always felt outmatched and destined to depart the first round, though there's plenty of optimism of what's to come in the desert.

You can take that from the NBA's top team.