Kevin Durant Reminded Suns Players Of His 12 Year Old ‘Down 0-2’ Run Against The Spurs To Motivate Them Ahead Of Game 3

The All-Star trio of Kevin Durant, Devin Booker, and Bradley Beal were hailed as the next big thing in the NBA. Instead, 10 months after creating this big three, the Phoenix Suns find themselves down 0-2 in the first-round series against the Minnesota Timberwolves. While the Arizona side’s morale will be hampered, not all confidence is lost. Reminding teammates of the comeback he led in the 2012 playoff, Durant still believes that the Suns could clinch the series.

As reported by Suns’ beat reporter, Duane Rankin, Kevin Durant tried motivating the Phoenix Suns by revealing an incident from 12 years ago. Durant has experience in winning a playoff series despite starting 0-2.

“I can give a speech about what a series is like being down 0-2 and coming back.”

Kevin Durant 0-2 with OKC, won next 4 to top Spurs, reach 2012 finals.

“I can go give that speech in the locker room all I want, but we still got to go out there and execute the game plan.” #Suns https://t.co/Z2yNIzAnOy

— Duane Rankin (@DuaneRankin) April 26, 2024

Back in the 2012 postseason, the San Antonio Spurs grabbed an early 2-0 lead in the Western Conference Finals. The entire basketball community was convinced that Tim Duncan and co. would make yet another trip to the NBA Finals. However, KD led the Thunder out of the pit that they were in. Averaging 29.8 points, 7.5 rebounds, and 5.8 assists for the remainder of the series (per StatMuse), the Slim Reaper led the Thunder 4-2 series victory, winning four straight games.

Arizona sports fans will hope that KD can pull off the same feat as he did 12 years ago and help the Phoenix Suns advance to the Western Conference Semifinals.

Kevin Durant explains how the Suns can improve on the offensive end

The Phoenix Suns finished the regular season at the 10^th spot in the league on the points-per-game list despite having three of the greatest scorers of this generation. Their offensive production worsened in the playoff, having scored 95 points in Game 1 and 93 points in Game 2 (a 22.2 points difference), per NBA.com.

Ahead of the third contest of the series, Kevin Durant explained how the Suns could improve offensively. While he emphasized the importance of being aggressive, accurate passing would also result in scoring opportunities, per KD.

“Be more aggressive, look to score. Opening up that scoring opens up a lot of passing. Sometimes when you look pass too much, our offense can get stagnant. Be more aggressive to put our head down, get to the rim, make a play, touch the paint.” Kevin Durant on offense. #Suns pic.twitter.com/bH0sAaPVaq

— Duane Rankin (@DuaneRankin) April 25, 2024

The Durantula also revealed how the team was still high on confidence as a unit.

Q: Is the whole team on the same page?

“Of course.” Kevin Durant.#Suns down 2-0 to T-Wolves. Game 3 Friday.

“If you dig deeper into who we are as a team and if you around us every day and see what we do and how we grind every day as a team, you wouldn’t ask those questions.” pic.twitter.com/SK9F9hdxEK

— Duane Rankin (@DuaneRankin) April 25, 2024

During the regular season, the Phoenix Suns weren’t able to capitalize on their home support. While they had a 24-17 record on the road, they won merely 25 out of 41 games at home (also scoring fewer points per game). With the series shifting to Arizona, Frank Vogel’s boys will hope that the crowd at the Footprint Center can help rally them to eventually level the series up 2-2.

As things stand, Anthony Edwards and co. are the favorites to advance to the Western Conference Semifinals. However, Kevin Durant and the Suns do have enough firepower to pave their way back into the series.