Sports

Did the Kings eat too much Christmas dinner before their game against the Portland Trail Blazers on Tuesday, December 26th? In the words of Kings commentator Duece Mason, “That was not serious basketball…it was awful.” Our boys Domantas Sabonis and De’Aaron Fox were both their All-Star selves, with Sabonis posting a double-double with 34 points, 12 rebounds, and five assists, and Fox scoring over 40 points for the fourth time this season, finishing the game with 43 points, eight rebounds, four assists, two steals, and a block. But Sabonis and Fox clearly can’t win the game by themselves.

The Kings’ defense, which has been their “Achilles heel” according to coach Mike Brown, gave up 130 points to the Trail Blazers, a season-high in scoring for that team. I guess that’s what happens when you don’t focus on stopping the other team and you only focus on scoring. That method can work when the shots are falling — we’ve seen it before — but it doesn’t work when the team makes only three of 27 three-pointers if you don’t count Fox’s scoring. The Kings lost to the Trailblazers, 113-130.

Not only did they lose against the Trail Blazers, they lost three out of four games this week, which is not okay in a Western Conference where seeds three through ten are all within four games of each other. The Kings are still in that sixth playoff spot, but the New Orleans Pelicans, who are in the seventh place spot, have the same number of wins, so there is absolutely no room to slack.

Let’s talk about the bright spot of the week: after a bad loss to the Boston Celtics, 119-144, the Kings bounced back against the Phoenix Suns and beat them 120-105. Sabonis got his fourth triple-double of the season with 28 points, 11 rebounds, and 12 assists. Fox passed up King’s legend, Mike Bibby, as the all-time assist leader in the Sacramento Era.

The next night was that dreaded back-to-back game against the number one team in the Western Conference, the Minnesota Timberwolves, and it didn’t go well; the Kings lost 98-110. But they did at least have some good runs and made me believe they could still come back and win, unlike during that game against the Trail Blazers.

The Kings have a chance to bounce back this Friday, December 29th, in Atlanta against the Hawks, on Sunday, December 31st, in Memphis against the Grizzlies, and then back at home for their first game of the new year on Tuesday, January 2nd, against the Charlotte Hornets. I fully expect the Kings to win all three of those games!

I hope everyone had a great holiday! For Christmas, I got my son a Kings Kids Club membership, which includes tickets to the first Kings game that he’ll remember (he technically saw Anthony Davis and the New Orleans Pelicans beat the Kings when he was two), so I can’t wait to report how the atmosphere at the Golden One Center is when we see the Toronto Raptors on January 5th. Go Kings!