2024–25 Phoenix Suns season

The 2024–25 Phoenix Suns season was the 57th season of the franchise in the National Basketball Association (NBA), as well as their 32nd season at the PHX Arena, formerly known as the Footprint Center until the arena's namesake expired on February 18, 2025 during a road trip in the season. It is also their second full season under the ownership group led by Mat Ishbia and Justin Ishbia after the brothers purchased the team on February 8, 2023, and their second season with their "Big Three" superteam of Devin Booker, Kevin Durant, and Bradley Beal together. This will be their second season in a row with a new head coach taking over since Monty Williams' firing following the announcement of Frank Vogel's firing on May 9, 2024, this time having 2021 NBA Finals champion coach Mike Budenholzer taking over as the new head coach two days later. This is also their first season since the 2019–20 season where the Suns would properly utilize the NBA G League again with their own squad (this time, the Valley Suns) after previously selling the Northern Arizona Suns to the Detroit Pistons during that season's suspension/reinstatement period and subsequently shutting down that G League team for the following season afterward in a move unrelated to their sale, thus marking the first time where every NBA team would utilize their own G League affiliate during a season. Entering this season, the Suns looked to enter the playoffs for the fifth straight season after previously missing the playoffs for a decade straight and at least improve upon their first round sweeping exit from the last postseason after failing to improve upon their previous season's record.

Before training camp began, on September 21, 2024, long-time broadcaster Al McCoy would pass away peacefully at 91 years old, with his final public appearance being when he helped introduce coach Mike Budenholzer to the public. On September 30, the day training camp began for the Suns, owner Mat Ishbia announced the Suns would dedicate this season to Al McCoy, with them wearing a black patch with the word "Al" written on it on their jerseys for every game this season. For their season opener, the Suns would spoil the new arena home opener of Intuit Dome for the Los Angeles Clippers in a tense 116–113 overtime win. In only six games, the Suns would already best their 10 game mark from last season with a 5–1 record. However, an injury to Kevin Durant (and a later injury to Bradley Beal) would delay them getting their 10th win of the season until November 26 against the Los Angeles Lakers after starting the season out with a 8–1 and then 9–2 record. By the 20 game mark of the season, the Suns would tie their mark from last season with a 12–8 record. On December 16, 2024, "The Original Sun" Dick Van Arsdale would pass away at 81 years old to kidney failure. By the end of 2024, the Suns would see themselves with a worse record entering 2025 than by that same point last season at 15–17, with the aftermath to their first game in 2025 resulting in the team making a significant change to their starting line-up by moving shooting guard Bradley Beal to the bench akin to his more natural shooting guard role for small forward Ryan Dunn and moving center Jusuf Nurkić to the bench (and later not playing him altogether) for Mason Plumlee, with rookie center/power forward Oso Ighodaro also receiving more playing time as well. This change would help get the team back to an average record again on January 12, with them later having an above-average record again by their halfway point of the season six days later on January 18, just days after trading for center Nick Richards, and again on January 22. However, after appearing to get things back on track by the end of January with a 10-5 month, chaos would unfold upon the team once again by February, with repeated failures to acquire Jimmy Butler from the Miami Heat and the rumored inclusion of Kevin Durant being traded for the Suns to get Butler instead of Bradley Beal in a reunion with the Golden State Warriors, Josh Okogie and Jusuf Nurkić would be traded to the Charlotte Hornets in separate deals in order to gain draft future draft flexibility alongside a couple of their players, and coach Mike Budenholzer was perceived to have lost control of his roster during a 3-10 stretch in February. Not only that, but with a 149-141 overtime loss to the Denver Nuggets on March 7, the Suns would fail to improve upon the previous season's overall record. On April 9, the Suns were eliminated from playoff contention for the first time since 2020 and the last Western Conference team to be eliminated following their loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder. On April 14, one day following the conclusion of the regular season, head coach Budenholzer was fired.