1. Shaq played a strong game: Face it Suns fans, that is about as good as Shaq is going to be as a Sun. He played hard, made some shots, rebounded and came in fresh from a long layoff with 10 days of practice to prepare. Those dives on the floor are going to take their toll, the poor defense you saw tonight? It will only get worse.

2. Nash and Amare were great: You cannot ask for more from them, Nash started 8-8 from the field, Stoudemire played his best game I have ever seen vs. the lakers.

3. Bynum and Ariza out. Bynum will slow Amare, Ariza will slow everyone else (he may even be the man to put on Nash in some situations). The lakers are short 2 key players and they still beat the Suns with depth tonight.

4. Suns at home: Remember that rocking crowd after Shaq made that dunk? Even that level of enthusiasm could not change reality. The Suns are not equipped to beat this new Laker team.

5. Lakers second night of a back to back. Nuff said.

6. Second half calls. The free throw disparity was appalling. The home cookin brought the Suns back into the game, but was still not enough to change the outcome. Don't forget that the late intentional fouls by the Suns will skew the final numbers.

I find the Suns fans kind of amusing.  They remind me of the Sacramento fans a few years ago (and Portland fans before that). Just because you field a decent team for a couple of seasons and win a couple of playoff series does not mean you get to bark at the big dogs. The Lakers were down after the Shaq/Kobe fiasco. The Suns put together a nice entertaining team and had a tougher time beating the Lakers in the playoffs than they should of. Now Suns fans are beating their chests and talking smack about the Lakers as if the Suns are supposed to be some type of rival.

The rebuilding is now done, the Lakers are back and poised to go on another multiple title run. The Suns will settle back into mediocrity in the next 3 years, but I will give you this. The Suns/Lakers series in the playoffs this year will be fun to watch.