Although it wasn’t the Suns’ night on the court, Canada’s son had a pretty good one.

A sellout crowd packed the GM Place on Thursday to show their appreciation for the best basketball player to ever come out Vancouver, as well as the best to ever come out of its country. Steve Nash and the Suns may have dropped their last preseason game to the Trail Blazers, 111-93, but that fact seemed to wash over the fans and everyone else who was at the arena.

Yes, the Suns were outrebounded 50-28, outscored 36-25 in the first quarter, surrendered 17 points to Brandon Roy in the first period and allowed 18 more second-chance points, but no one in Vancouver, British Columbia seemed to mind. Watching Nash walk around Vancouver must have been what it was like to see the Beatles at the height of their popularity.

“It was a pleasure and honor for me to bring my teammates back home,” he said. “It’s a lot to ask to fill an arena for an NBA preseason game especially with it not being the best of times now.

“I’m very surprised and flattered. It’s pretty amazing to have a sellout crowd, so let’s start campaigning for this again next year.“

From the moment No. 13 landed, he was inundated with photo and autograph requests. He met with representatives from his children’s foundation, visited with family and friends, went to shootaround, gave a tour of his health club to his teammates, m with ill children before the game, tallied 14 petoints and seven assists in 23 minutes and then spoke to hundreds of children after the game about what it takes to be a success.

That was just today.

“He’s a better person than he is a basketball player and that’s gotta be a pretty good person since he has two MVP trophies,” Suns Head Coach Alvin Gentry said. “He’s a wonderful person. From his foundation, to helping kids, to being incredibly green and wanting to save the whole world and the environment, I don’t know what more you can say about the guy.

“He’s a joy to coach, a great teammate and a great leader. Other than that, he’s just an average guy to us.”

When the two-time MVP was introduced to the crowd, the fans went absolutely bananas. Anytime he made a good play, they erupted.

The crowd was definitely pro-Suns, but above all, it was pro-favorite-son. I mean, the entire Vancouver Canucks team was front and center the entire night.

Late in the fourth quarter as the reserves were duking it out, the chant “We want Nash” arose from the crowd. Gentry, who ordinarily rests his point guard in the fourth period of a preseason game turned to his bench and said, “I don’t care what they want. They’re not going to get him.”

As the chanting grew louder, Nash diffused the situation by throwing one of his game sneakers into the crowd. During the next timeout, he tossed the other, rendering the possibility of him returning to zero.

“I’m glad he did that because it took the pressure off of me to put him in,” Gentry added.

His teammates knew the kind of response Nash would get in his home country, joking before the trip that he probably doesn’t even have to go through customs. It is so pro-Nash that when a reporter posed the idea of playing a couple of regular season games in Vancouver, he jumped at the idea.

“Someone said they were glad our owner wasn’t here because he would’ve moved the team here,” Nash joked. “If they want to move a couple of regular season games here it would be fantastic. Obviously for me, where should I sign? Vancouver feels like Phoenix North.”

The testament of how much this all meant to Nash lies in the fact that he even suited up at all. How many star players that sprained their ankle in the contest before would risk their health for a preseason game?

That’s why they love him in Canada. And that’s what they poured out in droves to show him.

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