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Devin Booker put on another outstanding post-season performance on Tuesday. He scored 31 points in 25 minutes and even once raised a baby sit in court. With Phoenix in the lead against the 8th-seeded New Orleans Pelicans, the Suns seemed on course for a 2-0 lead in the series.
But in the third quarter, Booker went back to the dressing room with an apparent injury. Suns coach Monty Williams later revealed that Booker was struggling with a hamstring problem that sidelined him for most of the second half. The heavily home-favored Suns lost Game 2 to the Pelicans 125-114 and find themselves tied in their streak at one game apiece.
Booker is expected to be treated and tested on Wednesday to determine the severity of the injury.
“We’ll have more information tomorrow,” said Suns coach Monty Williams after Game 2. “We played without Chris [Paul] and book in advance. If we have to play without a book, it’s the next turn. We’ve been doing that all year.”
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Now the series is moving to New Orleans, and while the Suns remain favorites with or without Booker, the pressure is suddenly on Phoenix. They no longer have home field advantage in the series, and while they had an 8-3 record in the 11 games they played without Booker before securing the No. 1 spot, playoff games are a whole different matter. Seven of those missed games were due to a hamstring injury Booker sustained in November, and while there’s no telling how serious it is, it kept him away for a little under three weeks. Generating offense without generating your top scorer is a much bigger challenge when teams have played you multiple times in a short amount of time.
All the Suns can hope for now is a positive prognosis for Booker’s hamstring. The hamstring can be a fickle body part when it comes to injuries, as Booker’s teammate Chris Paul well knows. The Suns may be able to escape the first round without Booker, but they need him if they plan to make it back to the NBA Finals.