The Tribune

By RENALDO DORSETT

Tribune Sports Reporter

rdorsett@tribunemedia.net

Deandre Ayton delivered an historic performance in his NBA Finals debut and after he helped the Phoenix Suns to a game one win with his 22 points and 19 rebounds, the third year centre said he will be well-rested and ready to repeat that effort in game two.

“I finally got a practice day where I could just take care of my body and get ready for game two,” Ayton said at yesterday’s practice session. “I think Doc came into that room last night after the game and he asked me how is my body feeling. I said, ‘I actually feel pretty well. You could imagine a couple years ago how I kept getting hurt.’ And he’s telling me it’s probably that ‘dad power.’ It’s probably true. Because there’s some things I surprise myself with the type of mental stamina I have, and, you know, me, seeing growth in my maturity, I guess it is.”

Ayton joined Bill Russell, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Wilt Chamberlain as the only players with 20 points, 15 rebounds, and 80 percent shooting from the field in an NBA Finals game in the shot clock era (since 1955).

His performance supplemented the 32 points and nine assists the Suns got from Chris Paul and the 27 points from Devin Booker. Ayton said that even at this point in the season his All-Star backcourt continues to offer support for the team to function at the highest level.

“Probably every day. They got to tell me something every day to click,” Ayton said. “You know, Book always has something to say in a good way, just to get me going. It’s really hard to really think about what they say that really clicked. I can just say they keep a consistent thing where they are always giving constructive criticism, and I take the best of it.”

With Paul engineering the offence, Ayton said it has made him more efficient in pick and roll offence as a screener and finisher.

“I think I became a legit screener when he came here. First thing he taught me that I’m going to need in my career for a while is learning angles, learning how to get people open and learn how to get open and learn how to set the screen with a person going over, under. I really learned when teams, I think in the Clippers series, when they were switching, I learned how to really get under the player that’s switching and really seal them off to get that good mismatch on either C or me, and I just carried it with me.

“And a guy like Jrue Holiday, who is really an on-ball screener, it’s tough to really get him, but just setting a good, solid screen just to get him and get C or Book free is about enough,” he said. “Yeah, I can seal, as well. But once they throw it down there, it’s going to be a lot of corral around me and it’s going to be too much. It’s going to be hectic down there. We’ve learned to counter it when teams try to front me, so I just allow them to front me and we play off it and read what we do best.”

Ayton also credits Paul for many of the Suns’ in game adjustments which has led to Ayton’s historic field goal percentage numbers.

“C always gets everybody involved and gets us going in rhythm. He starts to see how teams try to adjust and counter what we throw at them when it comes to our pick-and-roll. He tries to at least let me know what the dude is doing on ball or what my man is calling, either a switch or they’re down in the pick-and-roll and I try to adjust my angles on him to free him up and it opens up the floor,” he said.

The Suns lost backup forward Dario Saric to a torn ACL suffered in game one, but expects other members of the Suns’ bench to fill that role.

“We respect each other. We know how hard we work. The second unit, first unit, don’t matter. You know, last dude on the bench, off the bench, everybody has the same work ethic. Everybody has to bring it coming into practice. Everybody has to come in early, get some work done. Everybody has to touch the ball, put shots up, do something, and that’s why we’re so consistent in what we do now,” he said.

“There’s never really no laggers or anybody. Everybody picks it up and everybody is on each other. You know, it leads to the game when you put in work.”

Game two is tonight in Phoenix before the series shifts to Milwaukee for Games three (Sunday, July 11 at 8pm) and four (Wednesday, July 14 at 9pm). Game five (if necessary) is back in Phoenix on July 17 at 9pm, game six (if necessary) is in Milwaukee on July 20 at 9pm and the Suns will host game seven (if necessary), July 22 at 9 pm. All games will be broadcast on ABC.

The Suns won both regular season matchups by a combined margin of two points - a 125-124 win on February 10 and a 128-127 overtime win on April 19.