Back on December 19th, a Friday night, the Phoenix Suns went into Seattle and in one of the best games of the season, handed the SuperSonics a difficult 112-110 loss.  And on this Friday night, it was the Sonics turn to go into a hostile arena and hand the Suns a 113-105 loss.

``The main thing tonight was to control the tempo and not try to get into a run-and-gun game with this team,'' Seattle coach Nate McMillan said. ``We took our opportunity when we had it to push the ball, but for the most part I thought our halfcourt execution was good. This was a big win.''

With the victory, the Sonics improved to 9-2 against the top six teams of the league.

This is a battle of the league's two most improved clubs, as the Suns are 21 games better and Sonics are 11 games better.