Nash lifts Phoenix

SALT LAKE CITY (AP):

Phoenix Suns coach Alvin Gentry predicted his team would be a work in progress this year.

While the Suns don't have Amare Stoudemire anymore, they still have Steve Nash. And at 36, the All-Star guard showed no signs of slowing down.

He scored 18 points and had five assists to lift the Suns to a 110-94 victory over the Utah Jazz on Thursday night.

"It was undoubtedly an important game for us tonight," Nash said. "We learned our lesson and held our composure for longer stretches and, in particular, we held it together at the end of the game."

It wasn't just Nash. Reserve Hakim Warrick added 18 points and 11 rebounds, while Jason Richardson chipped in 16 points, including a pair of 3-pointers.

A better team

"Hakim was great on the glass and hustled," Nash said. "He finished and got to the line. He did a lot of little things that matter. But he also scored and when he can do that, it makes us a better team."

The Suns (1-1) led by as many as 18 points against a Jazz team that played with more intensity than during a 22-point season-opening loss at Denver on Wednesday night. But in the end the Jazz still had trouble finding the basket.

The Jazz shot just 33.3 per cent in the first quarter and 42.9 per cent for the game. Utah was just 3-for-13 on 3-pointers while Phoenix made 10 of 26 from behind the arc.

"They're good at pushing the ball up the floor and those things were difficult for us to handle," Utah coach Jerry Sloan said. "That's the way their team is designed. If you don't take good shots against them, and you end up taking jump shots out on the perimeter and you don't make them, then they're off and running."

Punched in the mouth

Al Jefferson, who the Jazz hope can fill the shoes of Carlos Boozer, scored 20 points to lead Utah (0-2). Paul Millsap added 19 points and 13 rebounds. Andrei Kirilenko also had 19 points.

"Things are not going our way. We've got to continue to stay with it. I mean, we've got to continue to get better," Millsap said. "We got punched in the mouth twice in our first two games."

Raja Bell struggled in a game against his former team, scoring just seven points on 3 of 12 shooting.

Nash scored 10 of his points in the first half to help the Suns build a 58-42 advantage at the break.

The Jazz would pull within six points after Deron Williams' dunk off a feed from Kirilenko. But the Suns had an answer in Nash.

He ended a 9-0 Utah run in the third quarter with a driving lay-up followed by a 3-pointer. Later in the quarter, Channing Frye fed Nash for another 3, giving the Suns a 78-67 lead.