PHOENIX — Devin Booker sprained his right ankle on Saturday night during the Phoenix Suns‘ 118-109 loss to the Houston Rockets.
Suns coach Frank Vogel said X-rays were negative on Booker’s ankle, and he didn’t immediately rule the All-Star out of Sunday’s home game against the Oklahoma City Thunder.
“We’ll see how he responds overnight,” Vogel added.
Booker was injured when he and teammate Royce O’Neale got their feet tangled with 1:15 left in the game. Booker, who scored 24 points, immediately limped off the court toward the locker room.
O’Neale also sustained a sprained right ankle. Vogel said O’Neale didn’t undergo X-rays because his injury was “not as much of a concern.”
The Suns also lost center Jusuf Nurkic with a sprained neck in the second quarter. He was also examined for a concussion but was cleared. Nurkic also was injured by a teammate as Josh Okogie accidently delivered a blow to Nurkic.
To make matters worse, Suns guard Bradley Beal was ejected in his return to the lineup after missing five games with a hamstring injury. Beal was assessed two quick technicals before departing.
The short-handed Suns couldn’t keep up with Jalen Green, who scored 34 points, while teammate Fred VanVleet added 24 for the Rockets.
“This is who we want to be every night,” said Green, who hit six 3-pointers.
Kevin Durant led the Suns with 30 points, and O’Neale added 20. Beal finished with seven points on 3-of-6 shooting.
“We fought, we battled back,” Vogel said. “We junked the game up like teams do to us sometimes. But it wasn’t enough.”
Green shot 12-of-23 from the field, including 6-of-12 on 3-pointers. Alperen Sengun added 21 points and 10 rebounds.
The Rockets led for most of the game, but the Suns cut it to 99-98 midway through the fourth quarter on Okogie’s layup. VanVleet responded with a 3-pointer to turn back the rally.
“It was good to see that fight, the physicality, I think we had that from the start,” Rockets coach Ime Udoka said. “It was obviously night and day from last game, when we got off to a poor start. Tonight, we kind of jumped out on them.”
The Suns defeated the Rockets 110-105 on Thursday.
Information from Field Level Media and The Associated Press was used in this report.
