Lindsey Hunter plans to get rid of the Phoenix Suns’ offensive system, which has been in place for much of the past decade.
Hunter changed the team's defensive principles after taking over for longtime coach Alvin Gentry, who was fired following a 13-28 start to the season.
“It’s easier to change the defense,” Hunter said. “Offensively, when you start messing with that, you’re messing with rhythm. You’re messing with familiarity. You’re messing with a lot of stuff that affects us. Slowly, I’ll implement some things. I’ll do it that way until the season’s over. Then hopefully everything works out and we can trash the old system and put mine in.”
Gentry was an assistant under former Suns coach Mike D’Antoni for five years, and continued to run a system similar to D’Antoni’s after he became head coach during the 2008-09 season.
“We can’t play the way Phoenix played in the past,” Hunter said. “We just can’t. We don’t spread the floor that way. We have Goran (Dragic), who is more of a scoring point and you’ve got to be sensitive to that. Getting our bigs going to the rim. Getting (Marcin) Gortat going to the rim and JO (Jermaine O’Neal) and getting (Jared) Dudley shots. It’s a different dynamic of a team.”