Phoenix Suns

The Phoenix Suns are an American professional basketball team based in Phoenix, Arizona, that competes in the National Basketball Association (NBA). The franchise is one of two expansion franchises to join the NBA in the 1968-69 season, has the NBA's seventh-best all-time winning percentage, and has the second highest winning percentage of NBA teams to never win an NBA championship.

Robert Sarver is the Managing Partner of the Suns ownership, after assembling a group of investors to purchase the team, the WNBA's Phoenix Mercury and operating rights to the Footprint Center (then named US Airways Center). The purchase took place 35 years after Sarver attended his first Phoenix Suns game, using tickets he received for his eighth birthday present from former original owner Donald Diamond.

The Suns are a member of the NBA's Western Conference Pacific Division, and the only team in the division not based in California. The team has won the division seven teams (1981, 1993, 1995, 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2021), and the Western Conference three times (1976, 1993 and 2021).

Ten Suns players have gone on to the NBA Hall of Fame, with Charles Barkley and Steve Nash also winning NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) while playing for the franchisePlayers inducted into the Suns Ring of Honor include Nash, Barkley, Dan Majerle, and Tom Chambers, and additional players whose numbers have been retired by the franchise include Dick Van Arsdale (5), Walter Davis (6), Kevin Johnson (7), Alvan Adams (33), Connie Hawkins (42), and Paul Westphal (44).

Additional players with notable tenures on the Suns include Shawn Marion, Amar'e Stoudemire, Shaquille O'Neal, Dennis Johnson and Leandro Barbosa. Current coaches Jason Kidd and Jeff Hornacek also played for the team; Hornacek coached the team from 2013-2016, finishing his Suns' head coaching tenure with a record of 101-112.

The team plays at the Footprint Center (formerly America West Arena, US Airways Center, Talking Stick Resort Arena, and Phoenix Suns Arena), located at 201 East Jefferson Street, Phoenix, Arizona, which opened on June 6, 1992 and has also housed the Arizona Coyotes (previously the Phoenix Coyotes) since July 1, 1996.

The Suns began as one of two expansion teams ahead of the 1968-69 season, in addition to the Milwaukee Bucks. The franchise was formed by a majority ownership group consisting of Karl Eller, Donald Pitt, Donald Diamond, Bhavik Darji, Marvin Meyer and Richard L. Bloch, and entertainment minority owners including Andy Williams, Bobbie Gentry, Ed Ames and more. The team began playing at the Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum, located northwest of downtown Phoenix, which it called home for the franchises' first 24 seasons.

The team went 16-66 in its inaugural season and 39-43 record in the 1969-70 season, which concluded with the Suns first trip to the playoffs. The team would lose in the first round to the Los Angeles Lakers in seven games (4-3).

The Suns were unable to reach the finals from the 2010-11 season until 2020-21. Despite the team winning all eight games in the 2020 NBA Bubble, created to determine the playoffs in the wake of the 2019-20 season's forced hiatus (due to COVID-19), the Suns failed to qualify for the playoffs.

The team rode the previous year's late momentum into the 2020-21 season, finishing the regular season in first place of the Pacific Division with a 51-21 (.708) record, which secured the No. 2 seed in the Western conference playoffs.

The Suns defeated the defending champion Los Angeles Lakers 4-2 in the opening series of the 2021 NBA playoffs, before sweeping the Denver Nuggets 4-0 in the Western Conference Semifinals. The team would go on to defeat the Los Angeles Clippers in the Western Conference Finals Series 4-2, moving on to the Sun's second NBA Finals in franchise history (Phoenix previously fell to Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls in six games during the 1992-93 season).