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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nDENVER (AP) Chris Paul couldn’t miss. Devin Booker couldn’t be stopped.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Phoenix Suns roared into the Western Conference Finals for the first time in 11 years Sunday night with a testy 125-118 victory over Denver that completed a four-game sweep.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Nuggets? Well, they went down fighting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Paul scored 37 points and Booker added 34 in a physical game marred by MVP Nikola Jokic’s ejection for a flagrant foul in the third quarter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jokic was tossed with 3:52 left in the third and his Nuggets trailing 83-76 after his hard right-hand windmill swipe sent the ball flying but also caught Cameron Payne in the face.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jokic said he meant only to commit a hard foul on Payne to spark his team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00bbI wanted to change the rhythm of the game, I wanted to give us some energy,\u00bb Jokic said. \u00bbI tried to make a hard foul. Did I hit him? I didn’t know. I say sorry if I did because I didn’t want to injure him or hit him in the head on purpose.\u00bb<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Booker took umbrage at the hard foul and got in the big man’s face before teammates and coaches pulled everyone apart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00bbIt was just an emotional play,\u00bb Booker said. \u00bbI don’t think he meant harm by it. It was just a frustration foul. It was tough, just defending my teammate. That was it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00bbI saw him go up to Cam after and apologize. I’ve played against the Joker multiple times. I know he’s not a malicious player.\u00bb<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Officials assessed a double technical on Jokic and Booker and after a review, ejected the MVP after upgrading his foul to a Flagrant 2. Jokic finished with 22 points and 11 rebounds in 28 minutes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Nuggets coach Michael Malone said he watched the play while the officials reviewed the call \u00bband I just assumed it would be a Flagrant 1 at the worst.\u00bb<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00bbI didn’t feel like it warranted a Flagrant 2 ejection because he’s making a play on the ball,\u00bb Malone said. \u00bbThere’s marginal contact to Cameron Payne’s nose, I believe. So, I was shocked. I’m still a little bit shocked that they called a Flagrant 2 and ejected the MVP on such a play.\u00bb<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Suns coach Monty Williams also was taken aback.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00bbI didn’t really think it was anything malicious,\u00bb Williams said. \u00bbIn those moments you have to regulate your emotions. That’s what we’ve been talking about all season long.\u00bb<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00bbAt replay review, we saw wind up, impact and follow through, which lead to unnecessary and excessive contact above the shoulders and also into the face,\u00bb crew chief David Guthrie explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With their franchise-record seventh straight playoff victory, the Suns advanced to the conference championship for the first time since 2010 – the last time they even reached the playoffs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
nba.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
DENVER (AP) Chris Paul no pod\u00eda fallar. No se pudo detener a Devin Booker. Los Phoenix Suns llegaron a las Finales de la Conferencia Oeste por primera vez en 11 a\u00f1os el domingo por la noche con una irritable victoria por 125-118 sobre Denver que complet\u00f3 una barrida de cuatro juegos. \u00bfLos Nuggets? Bueno, cayeron […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-110089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-basketball"],"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=110089"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110089\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":110091,"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110089\/revisions\/110091"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=110089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=110089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportseco.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=110089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}