Donte Green scored 40 points on 12-of-20 shooting to lead the Rockets past the Summer Suns 100-97 last night in Las Vegas in the opening game of the 2008 Summer League for both teams.

Suns sophomores D.J. Strawberry and Alando Tucker - last year’s picks in case you forgot - each scored 22 points in the Suns 2008 Summer League debut.

D.J. shot 7-for-15 from the field and missed on his only two 3-point attempts, including one in the closing seconds of the game that would have tied it at 100. Alando went 6-of-16 from the field and both grabbed 6 rebounds as well.

The biggest news of the day had to be Robin Lopez first game with the Suns. Robin had a solid game more or less confirming the scouting reports we saw immediately after the 2008 Draft: athletic player, solid rebounder, good defender, can run the floor but can’t shoot.

Lopez scored a good 19 points (5-for-13 from the field but a very poisitve 9-of-11 from the free-throw line), grabbed 5 rebounds, had 7 fouls called on him in 27 minutes of play.

From what we’ve seen last night nobody else really emerged as a possible candidate for a spot on the 2008/09 Suns roster.

It was the usual Summer League game, a lot of young athletic players running and hustling on both sides of the court, up and down all night. At least it was a real game of basketball.

The Suns (0-1) will now face the Spurs (1-0) on Thursday afternoon (5:30 PM).

Yours truly, Summer Steve Fan

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