When he was asked after Thursday’s practice about Phoenix potentially not having All-Star guard Devin Booker (right hamstring strain) for the rest of Round 1 of the playoffs, New Orleans guard CJ McCollum used an analogy from nature to describe how the Pelicans must approach the situation.
“I told the team many times, a wounded animal is more dangerous than a healthy animal, because you don’t know what to expect,” the nine-year NBA veteran said of Phoenix being without its leading scorer. “You don’t know what other players are going to step up. Game-planning changes, opportunity changes. As a player who’s had a lot of roles in his career, you relish the opportunity for a large role on this type of stage.”
Based on reporting from ESPN.com’s Adrian Wojnarowski, Booker may be sidelined for the rest of the series. The NBA’s top news-breaker tweeted Thursday that Booker “could miss 2-3 weeks” due to the injury he sustained during the third quarter of Game 2 vs. New Orleans.
League-best Phoenix went 56-12 when Booker played during the regular season, 8-6 when he was out, but two defeats in the latter category were in April with the Suns sitting numerous key players. Phoenix’s most impressive victory of 2021-22 sans Booker was a 21-point win over Boston on Dec. 10.
“They’re extremely dangerous,” Pelicans head coach Willie Green said. “With Booker, they’re dangerous. Without Booker, they’re dangerous. I’ll continue to say they’re well coached, they’re disciplined, they’re the No. 1 team in the league for a reason. We’ll have approach that game as such.”
During a seven-game stretch in December, Phoenix went 5-2 while Booker was out of action, relying on a balanced offensive attack, with eight different Suns averaging double-digit scoring (Deandre Ayton 19.4, Cam Johnson 14.6, Chris Paul 14.3, Cam Payne 12.9, JaVale McGee 12.0, Mikal Bridges 11.4, Jae Crowder 11.1, Landry Shamet 10.4).
“They’re still a very good team,” McCollum said. “Obviously Book is a special, special talent, and I hope he gets back as soon as possible. Injuries are a terrible part of the game.”
Other notes from Thursday practice:
McCollum has been a top-tier player in the NBA for such a lengthy span that it’s easy to forget that it took him a few seasons to establish himself as a prominent part of Portland’s rotation. He pointed out Thursday that he didn’t make his first playoff start until his third season in 2015, when the Trail Blazers faced Memphis in Round 1 and were eliminated in five games. Over McCollum’s first two years in the playoffs, he never logged more than eight minutes in any game. By comparison, New Orleans had three rookies in just Game 2 alone Tuesday who played much more than that (Herbert Jones 40:58, Trey Murphy III 20:08, Jose Alvarado 17:02).