PHOENIX, Jan. 29 (Ticker) -- Shawn Marion may have been outscored by Ron Artest, but his final shot proved to be the difference.

Matched up against Artest for most of the contest, Marion scored 24 points and hit a 20-foot jumper that gave the Phoenix Suns a 91-90 victory over the lowly Chicago Bulls.

Marion's shot came with 1:10 remaining and extended the Suns' lead to 91-88. Artest, who finished with 26 points, made two free throws with 55.8 seconds, but the Bulls failed to capitalize on two missed shots by Rodney Rogers.

Under intense defensive pressure, A.J. Guyton threw up an airball just before the final buzzer as Chicago dropped to 1-20 on the road.

NBA.comTV highlights from Bulls-Suns: 56k | 300k Penny Hardaway had a very solid all-around game, but it almost wasn't enough to prevent an upset loss to the Bulls. Barry Gossage NBAE/Getty Images

Artest, who may be the closest thing Chicago has to a go-to guy, decided to pass to Guyton, who was hounded by Stephon Marbury.

"If I could do it over again, I probably would have taken the shot," Artest said. "It was a smaller Marbury down there. So I should have taken it, but I tried to get it out to A.J. There were a couple of things I could have done differently."

"We knew they were going to Artest and they did and we covered him pretty good," Suns coach Scott Skiles said. "Maybe they shouldn't have run the time down. I thought we did a good job defensively to cause them to do that."

The Bulls scored the first seven points of the fourth quarter and climbed within 76-75 on rookie Tyson Chandler's layup with 8:39 remaining.

Chicago regained the lead on Fred Hoiberg's 15-footer with 4:53 left, but the Suns countered with a 7-2 surge before Artest's 3-pointer sliced the deficit to 89-88.

In the estimation of Bulls coach Bill Cartwright, poor shot selection down the stretch prevented his team from coming all the way back.

"I was really displeased with our shot selection at the end of the game," he said. "Our choices were very bad and it is upsetting that we work this hard and then not give ourselves an honest opportunity to win."

The Suns, who blew a 19-point lead on Thursday at New York shot just 41 percent (7-of-17) in the fourth quarter and were outscored, 22-15, as they barely avoided being the first Western Conference team to lose to Chicago since February 6, 2000.

However, the Bulls' futility against the West could have ended had they duplicated one of the better first-half performances of the season.

Artest had 15 points as Chicago shot 62 percent (23-of-37) and grabbed a 55-53 lead, capitalizing on Skiles' benching of Marbury in the second quarter.

But former Bull Jake Voskuhl's two-handed dunk capped a 12-3 run and put Phoenix in front, 74-65, with 2:45 to go in the third period. Chicago managed just 13 points in the quarter.

"It would be like playing the Lions this year," Suns guard Penny Hardaway said, referring to the NFL's version of the Bulls. "Everybody was trying not to lose. So when you are playing a team like the Bulls, with only one win on the road and 0-for-whatever against the Western Conference, you don't want to be that first loss. So you go into it not to lose, instead of playing your game.

"A win's a win. Hopefully, this will get us rolling, but the next game is going to be tough. It's in Portland and hopefully, we got all the bad stuff out of the way before we go on the road to Portland."