![\"Phoenix](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/01kp28zr6e7p7b85fmvt.jpg\" "\\"Phoenix")
<\/p>\nPHOENIX — The Phoenix Suns will officially host the Portland Trail Blazers in the opening Western Conference play-in matchup Tuesday night at 7:00 p.m. MST at Mortgage Matchup Center.<\/p>\n
Portland (42-40) clinched the eighth seed in the West with a 122-110 victory over the Sacramento Kings tonight.<\/p>\n
The Suns (45-37) have been locked into the No. 7 seed since Wednesday, but were just waiting on whether they would play Portland or the Los Angeles Clippers, who lost the tiebreaker against the Blazers when Portland defeated L.A. 116-97 on Friday. <\/p>\n
This will be Phoenix’s first time in the play-in, while Portland was in the first-ever play-in tournament back in the bubble in 2020 and advanced as the No. 8 seed, although it was a different format. <\/p>\n
The winner of Tuesday’s 7-8 matchup will go on to play the No. 2-seeded San Antonio Spurs in the first round. <\/p>\n
The loser of this opening game will host the winner of the 9-10 matchup, which will be played on Wednesday between the No. 9 Clippers and No. 10 Golden State Warriors, on Friday with the winner of this game advancing to play the No. 1 Oklahoma City Thunder. <\/p>\n
This final play-in matchup will be on Friday at 7:00 p.m. MST.<\/p>\n
Suns’ Outlook in Play-In vs Blazers<\/p>\n
Feb 3, 2026; Portland, Oregon, USA; Phoenix Suns guard Jordan Goodwin (23) recognizes teammate guard Collin Gillespie (12) during the second half against the Portland Trail Blazers at Moda Center. Mandatory Credit: Jaime Valdez-Imagn Images | Jaime Valdez-Imagn Images<\/p>\n
The Suns are 2-1 against the Blazers this season, but were without Devin Booker for the last two meetings on Feb. 3 and Feb. 22, <\/p>\n
Collin Gillespie played very well against Portland this season, averaging 22.3 points and 6.3 assists over these three games by exploiting some of the drop coverage Portland used. <\/p>\n
Phoenix could be fully healthy going into the matchup, although it’s unclear what the statuses of Grayson Allen (left hamstring), Jalen Green (right knee) and Jordan Goodwin (left ankle sprain) will be after all were injured in the past week.<\/p>\n
Luckily, these injuries, besides potentially Allen’s, looked pretty minor.<\/p>\n
As for the Blazers, Jerami Grant has no timetable for return with a calf injury, while Shaedon Sharpe has played the last two games for Portland after missing 28 in a row with a left fibula stress reaction.<\/p>\n
Damian Lillard is out for the year after tearing his Achilles last season. <\/p>\n
Going into tonight, Portland ranked 21st in the NBA in offensive rating (113) and 12th in defensive rating (113.6), as its defense has found its footing as of late after starting the season slow on that side of the ball (fourth in defensive rating since All-Star break).<\/p>\n
Deni Avdija led Portland all year long and finished his breakout season averaging 24.2 points, 6.9 rebounds and 6.7 assists. <\/p>\n
The biggest key for the Suns will be finding a way to combat Portland’s size, as they have struggled against bigger teams with their smaller lineup. <\/p>\n
“They’re big. They play well in the paint which we’ve struggled against but we’ll find a way. We’ll have to go after their mismatches and the different things they present that they’re weak at and exploit it,” Suns forward Dillon Brooks said of Portland on Friday. <\/p>\n
Suns coach Jordan Ott has made a point all season long to emphasize winning the possession game, which involves forcing turnovers and grabbing offensive rebounds and would make up for the size differential. <\/p>\n
Portland averaged the most turnovers per game in the NBA by far at 17.3 per game, which could play perfectly into the Suns’ hands. <\/p>\n
This could be a game where Phoenix just has to try to focus on what it does best and not beat itself with unnecessary turnovers and poor shooting, which has been a theme lately. <\/p>\n
All eyes are now on the postseason, and we will see how the Suns come out after a surprise regular season where they exceeded their projected win total by 14 games. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOENIX — The Phoenix Suns will officially host the Portland Trail Blazers in the opening Western Conference play-in…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":724096,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5131],"tags":[5229,5643,1587,1589,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-724095","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-phoenix","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-arizona","10":"tag-az","11":"tag-phoenix","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-united-states-of-america","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","16":"tag-us","17":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116395267105357018","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/724095","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=724095"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/724095\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/724096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=724095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=724095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=724095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}