Suns Reveal Play-In Starters vs Trail Blazers

PHOENIX — It's nearly time for the Phoenix Suns' postseason to begin.

The Suns welcome the Portland Trail Blazers to town for Tuesday night NBA play-in tournament action at Mortgage Matchup Center.

Suns head coach Jordan Ott is rolling with the following starting lineup tonight:

Suns Reveal Starting Lineup vs Blazers

• Devin Booker
• Jalen Green
• Dillon Brooks
• Jordan Goodwin
• Mark Williams

Opening tip is slated for just past 7:00 PM AZ time.

Phoenix has won two of three matchups against the Trail Blazers this season, though Ott was very adamant the Suns are aware of their recent form:

"Top-five defense the last 20 games, they have really good defensive personnel. And then offensively, they crash. They drive and crash," Ott said of Portland pre-game.

"Top five driving team, top five crashing team, get on the glass and they're going to shoot it. So they kind of space you out, more five-out when Clingan's out there. They put your defense in a bind, knowing that they're going to shoot it, and then you have to find a body. And [Donovan] Clingan's so big. [Robert] Williams is so big, you'd love to double team them at some points, but they crash so well, it's hard sometimes to double team because they got wings coming in. So that'll test us, every possession will be hard fought."

While it's not quite a playoff game (officially, anyways) the Suns still are hoping to use some of their prior postseason experience to use tonight.

Even Ott acknowledged tonight was different.

"We have some experience going through it, but we all know. We know that this game feels different. You can think that it's the same game as the other 82, it's not," he said.

"The last 48 hours don't feel the same, but everyone's feeling it. So we need that balance of healthy tension, and then the confidence to go out and play and know that the work has been done the whole season. It's not something new that we're going to do tonight that you haven't seen all season."

The winner of tonight's matchup will go on to play the San Antonio Spurs in the first round of Western Conference playoff action while the loser will face the winner of the Los Angeles Clippers vs Golden State Warriors battle. The winner of that game will face the Oklahoma City Thunder in the first round.

The Suns do have some history on their side, as no No. 7 seed has failed to miss the playoffs since the inception of the play-in tournament.