IN THE LANE

LITTLE EXTRA: If it seemed as if there was a little extra coming from the Phoenix Suns in Wednesday night’s victory at FTX Arena, that’s because there was a little extra. Guard Devin Booker said the Suns’ 123-100 home Jan. 8 home loss to the Heat still resonated. “We wanted this one bad, to be completely honest,” he said. “We have a lot of respect for their team, especially for what they did to us in Phoenix. We just wanted to prove a point. They’re playing the best basketball over here in the East and we’re doing the same in the West, so it was a heavyweight matchup.” And practically a TKO, in light of the Suns’ 111-90 romp.

AGING OUT: At 28, it appears Josh Richardson has found himself aged out of the San Antonio Spurs’ rotation. Attached as salary to the draft picks acquired from the Boston Celtics at the trading deadline for Derrick White, the former Heat guard has been held out of five games since joining the Spurs on Feb. 10. “I’m the big bro around here,” Richardson said, according to San Antonio’s Express News, with only Doug McDermott, 30, older on the Spurs’ roster. “This is new for me, being one of the oldest guys on the team.” As recently as 2017-18 and ‘18-19, his final two seasons with the Heat, Richardson had started all 154 of his appearances. “A lot of it is mental,” Richardson said. “When you’re not playing every day, it’s easy to get down on yourself and start blaming other people and start thinking of dumb excuses.”

SECOND CHANCES: To a degree, the Heat may have extended Nik Stauskas’ NBA career with the emergency 10-day contract they extended in December amid the team’s COVID outbreak. From there, a renewed Stauskas returned to the G League, where he scored 100 points over a two-game span with the Denver Nuggets’ affiliate and then landed a two-year contract with the Celtics. “I was ready to give in, to be honest,” the 28-year-old 6-foot-6 guard said, according to the Boston Globe.“Just playing in the G-League all year. I had told myself that if it didn’t work out this year, that I’d be OK with walking away from the game. . . . It’s been a long time coming for me, personally, just to kind of get back to this point, kind of cracking a roster.”

PERSEVERANCE CITED: Having guided Victor Oladipo for part of last season, Houston Rockets coach Stephen Silas said he was heartened by Oladipo’s comeback with the Heat. “Obviously, for Victor, it’s great for him, after everything he has been through, the injuries. It’s like one after the other,” Silas said before Monday night’s game at FTX Arena. “He’s competitive. He wants to do things the right way. He is a fighter. For him to fight through all of the injuries that he has had and manage the ups and downs, the emotional part of what he’s been through is admirable.”