No series since 1995, when Phoenix blew a 3-1 lead to the Houston Rockets and an 18-point second-quarter lead in Game 7 of that series before Elie's game-winning three, has been as painful for the Suns. Had Phoenix just closed out Houston in one of those three games, they most likely would have cruised past the Orlando Magic -- a talented yet callow team led by two future Suns, Penny Hardaway and Shaquille O'Neal -- in the NBA Finals for the city's first major professional championship.

Alas, it was not to be in 1995, and thanks to Robert Horry and a corrupt referee named Tim Donaghy, it was not to be in 2007. Let us not be too revisionist, though: The Spurs were the NBA's most formidable team last season, and even if Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw had not been suspended for Game 5 of the Western Conference semis last May, there's no assurance that the Suns would have won that game, much less the series. After all, San Antonio has an 8-5 postseason record at Phoenix since Duncan entered the league.

Still, if you are an individual member of Planet Orange (an "Agent Orange?"), you wanted this first-round match-up. You wanted Steve Nash and his band of inimitable first-named teammates (Amare, Boris, Leandro, Raja, Shaquille ... keychain-ready names they are not) to get another shot at Duncan, Ginobili and Tony Parker. You've waited 11 months for this, and you have no patience for some first-round series vs. Utah or Houston. If the Suns cannot beat San Antonio, then what difference does a preliminary playoff series win make?

You want San Antonio. You want to figuratively hip-check Robert Horry into an early summer vacation. You want Bruce Bowen's blood the way Chicago Bulls fans once wanted Rick Mahorn's. You want Eva Longoria to show up at U.S. Airways Arena and then show fan shots on the Jumbo-tron of all the Phoenix lasses who are hotter than she is.

You admire Duncan, but you want to see him lose.

You want, most of all, to see Nash win. For the Suns' own two-time MVP to be rewarded for last year's Hannibal Lecter face and all the passion he has instilled in this franchise since 2004.

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It was only Game 1 of Round 1, even if it did not feel that way. "It feels like a Finals game," Duncan said afterward. "It's the first game of the first series, and we're going to have to muster energy up."

As will the Suns, who have had to pick themselves up/dust themselves off many a time since Nash returned to the Valley in 2004. Because none of these wrenching defeats would be so painful if the Suns, who have averaged nearly 58 wins per year since Nash became their starting point guard four seasons ago, were not Finals-worthy. But they are.

It's legacy time for players such as Nash, Leandro Barbosa, Raja Bell, Boris Diaw and Amare Stoudemire, who have been teammates for three seasons now. Unlike the team's rent-a-cop, O'Neal, none of them have championship rings. And this may be the last, or second-to-last, season that this thermal core of Suns has a realistic shot of winning one together.

This is their moment. Will Nash and the Suns be remembered as the NBA's most entertaining team -- over a four-year span -- that could never even advance to the Finals? Or will Phoenix at last win the gut-check games against a San Antonio team whose only real advantage over them is their fortitude?

Planet Orange? How about "Determi Nation?"

San Antonio. And if the Suns get past the reigning champs, then likely New Orleans. Then Los Angeles. Then Boston. Good luck.

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