The Sacramento Kings are back in action tonight and looking to secure a no-worse-than .500 record for the season, but will have to do so against the best team in the Eastern Conference. The victors in 19 of their last 21 games, the Bucks have caught their second wind and are looking Finals ready with fifteen games still to go in the regular season. One little, tiny hiccup – their MVP candidate, Giannis Antetokounmpo… he’s day-to-day with a banged-up hand and at the time of this writing is not confirmed to be playing tonight. Can the best offense in the league find a way to break through a team with, like, three Defensive Player of the Year worthy candidates? Can Mike Brown best another Coach of the Year hopeful? Will Grayson Allen play a normal game of basketball for once in his career?
Let’s talk Kings basketball!
When: Monday, March 13th, 7:00 PM PT
Where: Golden 1 Center, Sacramento, CA
TV: NBC Sports California
Radio: Sactown Sports 1140
For Your Consideration
Even Steven: There is something in the water right now in Sacramento. The Kings are rocking an improbably positive season, sure, but, we’ve seen the Sac State football team have maybe their best season ever, the women’s basketball team is headed to the NCAA Tourney for the first time in school history, I saw someone use a turn signal on Watt Avenue the other day – I’m telling you… miracles are being performed out here.
Now to the one in front of us today – the Kings can guarantee themselves a season of at least .500 basketball tonight. It’ll take going up against a Bucks squad that’s lost a total of two games since mid-January, with the third best rated team defense in the league and with, maybe, the best player on the planet right now. The Bucks play fast (11th in pace) they score in bunches (115.9 a contest, 9th in the NBA) and are the best defensive and overall rebounding squad in the NBA. They are, in all sense of the word, championship contenders, and with elite coaching, elite players on both ends of the court and in both starting and supporting roles… a win tonight, Giannis playing or otherwise, will be incredibly difficult.
The Bucks this season feel like a nightmare match-up for the Kings, with dynamic bigs in Antetokounmpo, Brook Lopez and Bobby Portis that can bother Domantas Sabonis with different looks, guards like Jrue Holiday and Jevon Carter to harass De’Aaron Fox every second he’s on the court, and plenty of superb role players like Khris Middleton (who, in any other non-injury year, would be considered a star) Grayson Allen, Pat Connaughton to fill in any gaps in Coach Budenholzer’s schemes.
And yet, as has become a frighteningly common occurrence for a fan of a team with a 16 year playoff resume gap, I think the Kings can beat them… not just once but maaaaybe even four in seven tries. Do I legitimately believe the Kings are Finals bound, as I said above the fold? Eh no. But every single game since the All-Star Break has been a true test of what the Kings might be able to bring to a playoff series. Sometimes they give up 175 points, or 23 offensive rebounds, sometimes they allow the Wolves to set rules of the night’s game… but most of the time, eight out of the last nine to be exact, they’re leaving victorious. They’re playing like a playoff team when a playoff team is supposed to be playing well. They won’t be considered a favorite in any match-up come the playoffs, or hell, even tonight. But anyone who’s going up against them right has to be spending an extra five minutes in the mirror explaining to themselves why the Kings aren’t as good as their record indicates.
And for my money, I bet they believe it a little less every time they say it.
Prediction
Giannis plays and future MVP candidate Kessler Edwards makes him regret it, hounding him everywhere he goes, haunting him like a waking nightmare. Fox saves it for a fourth quarter display to pull away and Sabonis somehow manages 15 rebounds against the best rebounding team in the league.
Kings: 122, Bucks: 117
You’re lying about seeing a turn signal on Watt, you big liar.
I tend to agree especially if they are turning onto a street like El Ricon San Ysidrio or Buena Vista
Milwaukee’s now leading the East,
And Giannis we know is a beast.
But we may catch a break;
His right hand may still ache.
If he’s out, helps our chances at least!
I always believed Giannis was Achilles reincarnated.
But maybe he’s got an Achilles’ Hand.
https://twitter.com/SeanCunningham/status/1635440369289797633
The victory shall be that much sweeter!
(bites fingernails anxiously)
Giannis ducking Fox?
DUCK…DUCK…FOX!
(boop)
https://twitter.com/swipahaliburton/status/1633717281384697856?s=20
ducking Kessler Edwards.
All others are weak. Domas is player of the week.
.
.
.
https://twitter.com/NBA/status/1635363229940744196?s=20
And Domas needed half as many thumbs as Embiid.
He has been major for us.
“I’m only going to use my thumb. My right thumb. Left one’s much too powerful for you.
Presidio references FTW!
Today it seems that the Kings are everything, everywhere, all at once.
The franchise has a very strong Oscar history.
Contrary to what L*kers fans say on twitter, the Kings will NOT be a Short Round playoff exit.
Better yet, all the Data points to the Kings making a deep playoff run.
You guys are horrible. 😂😂😂😂
Interesting decision time for Budenholzer. They surprisingly lost to Steph and Dubs (still without Wiggins) on Saturday and play Sacramento tonight and Phoenix tomorrow.
That could end up being a 3 game L streak. IMO, that shouldn’t worry Milwaukee, but it may cause them to falter on the 1 seed.
As we are fresh from films’ biggest night of the year, rather than Fear the Deer, I would like to think of Sacramento more like the 1979 Best Picture winner.
Giannis doesn’t have a bronze statue in Milwaukee.
The Fonz > Giannis.
…yet.
No one expects the yet.
The Dubs have such an insane home/away split that it doesn’t shock me at all when they beat the Bucks in SF or lose to the Rockets in Houston
The Genius of Mike Brown never ends. Just when you think the Kings are on the ropes, they channel their inner Inigo Montoya and let the competition know that they are not left handed. Whether it’s a dormant Fox hanging a 20 point fourth quarter or a late season substitution of Kessler Edwards who might even be better than the greatest King of all time, The Brockness Monster. Let’s just hope that the Bucks are not the Westley in this terrible analogy.
So, so many jokes. But I have a true story instead. Before the Light Rail station at Watt/Manlove, that stretch of Watt that goes through southbound towards Florin/Elk Grove etc etc didn’t exist. You had to turn left onto Folsom Blvd (seriously) and then take a right on Manlove to actually get to that stretch of S Watt.
I’m very glad they decided to erect the road that extra 500 feet and build that bridge that overlooks S Watt these days. 40 years ago, man. Sac was a very different place.
I remember my dad giving me driving lessons on the 99 from Mack through Elk Grove.
I remember it looking like the wastelands of The Road Warrior. All empty and desolate.
(I think we’re doing a movie theme in this thread now because of the Oscars?)
Anybody see undisputed where they ask if this game could be a potential finals preview? Shannon gave it a 000000001 percent chance while Skip surprisingly stood up for us. Man, can’t wait for the Kings to prove all the disrespectful talking heads wrong.
I joked about this in our earlier matchup against the Bucks.
It would be hard to fathom still, but it’s not so crazy to think about as before.
depending on the matchups I would be disappointed if we didn’t get to atleast the 2nd round.We should be able to beat Warriors, Clippers, Dallas, Minnesota in the first round.
If you’d like to make a bet as to whether this happens or not, I’ll bet the No and give you fat odds.
“Disrespectful…”
Even now, predicting which two teams will be in the finals is incredibly difficult. I’m a huge fan of this team, I don’t think for a minute that the Kings are getting to the finals, and Milwaukee is hardly a lock, even with so much experience and talent.
Sacramento will continue to suffer slings and arrows for many years, because stink is hard to get off of things. All Sharpe did was say something that is far, far more likely to be true than false.
It will be very important going forward for people to know the difference. We are hardly above being insufferable.
Grayson Allen is a weasel, he looks like a weasel,,,,he should be tracked down and trapped by the old Mountain Man and stuffed by any player seeing him going after Domas’ bad thumb
He’s worse-looking than a weasel. You are insulting weasels, who gave us the roadmap for how to get out of things that we don’t want to do.
No, Grayson Allen looks like Ted Cruz, who, I will concede, is from the weasel family.
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