PHOENIX — Without injured stars Bradley Beal and Kevin Durant, the Phoenix Suns’ best hope of defeating the Oklahoma City Thunder on Friday night rested on the shoulders of Devin Booker.

It didn’t really happen.

The Thunder blew and swarmed Booker from start to finish, daring basically every other player to beat them, and that strategy paid off in a 99-83 loss to Phoenix.

Booker scored 12 points on 2-10 shooting from the field, including four turnovers and a -29 plus/minus. Josh Okogie led the Suns with 15 points.

The Suns are now 9-4 on the season and 1-1 in the NBA Cup. This was the first time all season that Phoenix was held to under 100 points.

The scoring was overwhelming for Phoenix, who were also down Grayson Allen due to injury.

It was a terribly slow start for the Suns, who found themselves down 29-14 after the first 12 minutes of play. Phoenix made just 3-of-21 open-action shots while making just 1-of-11 free-throw attempts. Josh Okogie was the only Suns player with more than four points at the end of the first.

With a minute left in the first half, the Suns finished an 11-2 run before finally beating the locker room 48-36. Booker went 0-6 from the field in the first half while the Thunder had nine players score.

The third quarter was no kinder to Phoenix – despite cutting their deficit to 11 – trailing 83-60 entering the fourth. The Thunder had just five turnovers in the first three quarters while outscoring the Suns 44-18.

Usually in a blowout loss, teams would empty their benches and wave the white flag early in the fourth – but with the score difference being a tie-breaker in the NBA Cup game, Mike Budenholzer chose to keep his starters to minimize the damage until the fifth minute of the fourth after that the Suns couldn’t shake off their 20-point deficit.

Oklahoma City comfortably held that lead until the final buzzer.

The Suns conclude their four-game road trip on Sunday against the Minnesota Timberwolves.