Game 67: Hive Five

That wasn't too surprising a result, all in all. We got beat by a playoff-bound team, jockeying for playoff position. So I think I'll stick with the positives for tonight.

Some quick bullets:

• Marcus Thornton continued his ridiculous play of late, with 28 points on 21 shots. He finished the game 12-18, after a slow start, including 26 points in the second half. Excluding his nine-minute cameo when he returned from injury against Boston, Buckets has now hit double figures in 21 consecutive games! (And it's actually 29 consecutive games of 9 or more).
• Collison connected on just 6 of 14, but that won't keep me from enjoying his 10:3 assist to turnover night. Turnovers have really been the only mark on an otherwise stellar rookie campaign, so his ball control in a high paced game is well appreciated.
• We got a couple interesting moments with players in the air- Jason Richardson's dunk in the fourth, and Grant Hill's injury in the third. 
• David West has really struggled to get to the line this year, compared with previous years, but over the past four games, he's now been there a combined 28 times.
  
• The Hornets allowed an absurd 63 eFG% to the Suns tonight. The Suns turned the ball over a good bit and didn't rebound particularly well, but there's no real way to overcome such awful field goal defense.
  

Jumping to the Chris Paul front, there's apparently some speculation he could return during this road trip (the last game of the trip is Saturday at Utah). I doubt the timetable is that short, but I guess it's possible. Bright Side of the Sun passed along the audio of this pregame chat with Coach Bower, talking about Collison, West, and Paul among other things. And, via "theassociation" on Youtube, comes this video of Chris Paul practicing before the game.

Suck it, Bill Simmons.