The Kings have already won the season series against Houston, winning both games against the Rockets at home in what were very physical and close contests throughout. But now the Kings are in Houston’s territory, a much tougher environment as the Rockets are 20-9 at home this season. This is a big step up from Sacramento’s last two opponents, so hopefully the Kings are ready to respond in kind.
Let’s talk Kings basketball!
When: Saturday, March 1st, 5:00 PM PT
Where: Toyota Center, Houston, TX
TV: NBC Sports California
Radio: Sactown Sports 1140 AM
For Your Consideration
The Rockets have taken a major leap this season, but of late they’re actually slipping a bit in the standings. The last time the Kings faced Houston they were solidly in 3rd place in the Western Conference, but Denver and the Lakers have leapfrogged them and Houston now sits in 5th. There’s only 1.5 games separating 2nd and 5th so homecourt in the first round is still very much in play for the Rockets. The Kings meanwhile are just fighting to stay in the playoff race. Sacramento is solidly in 10th right now, 3 games ahead of the 11th place Suns and 1.5 games behind the Clippers and Warriors who sit tied for 6th.
Houston, unlike Sacramento, stood pat at the trade deadline, conserving their ammo for the offseason and seeing how much damage this current group could do this season. Jabari Smith is recently back from injury as well, bringing a boost to Houston’s frontcourt. Smith missed the last matchup against the Kings, as did Fred VanVleet, who is listed as questionable coming into tonight as he’s dealing with an ankle injury.
The Kings have played well against the Rockets so far this season despite Houston being a team seemingly built to give the Kings trouble; Houston is long at almost every position, with athletic wings like Smith, Tari Eason, Dillon Brooks, Cam Whitmore and rising star Amen Thompson. Thompson in particular might be the most athletic player in the NBA today, and he was a force in the last game against the Kings, scoring 20 points on 8-12 from the floor with 10 rebounds, 5 assists and 2 blocks, all while holding De’Aaron Fox to 6-17 shooting. That’s not even to mention Jalen Green, who always seems to bring his A-game against the Kings.
Alperen Sengun and Steven Adams are also solid interior presences that have given Domantas Sabonis trouble in the past, although Sabonis has done well in both matchups against Houston this season. Hopefully he can rediscover a bit of his mojo tonight as he’s been a bit off of late. Against Utah, Sabonis was thoroughly outplayed by Walker Kessler, scoring just 12 points and grabbing 9 rebounds, a rare two games in a row that Sabonis has failed to notch a double-double. I’m not sure whether Sabonis is playing hurt or merely more affected by Sacramento’s new roster shakeup than others (or more likely some combination of both), but the Kings need to figure out how to keep him involved early and often as he’s this team’s most important player. For those wondering how Zach LaVine has done against Houston this year, he’s only played them once and scored 15 points on 4-9 shooting in a 36 point Bulls loss back in November. LaVine was the only Bulls rotation player to score double-digits that game.
Both these teams have had a couple of days off and so should be well rested. I’m going to guess this one’s going to be very physical, much like the previous two were, but if the Kings can take care of the ball and keep the Rockets from killing them in the fastbreak (3rd in the NBA in fastbreak points a game), they should have a good chance, as the Rockets offense slows way down in the halfcourt.
For the Kings, this is yet another opportunity to get through the two games above .500 barrier, something they have yet to do this season. The last time they had a chance was just before the All-Star break against the Zion-less Pelicans, where they fumbled their opportunity. Tonight will be a much tougher test, but sometimes that’s what’s needed for the Kings to give their utmost.
Prediction
Someone’s getting ejected tonight and Ime Udoka is definitely getting at least one technical.
Kings 115, Rockets 107
At the break the Rockets were crashing;
More than once they took a bad thrashing.
Made no trade bid for Fox,
Even with some hard knocks.
We’d sure love to give them a bashing!
+1 Let’s give the Rockets slim pickin’s!
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Ride the Rockets. It’s a Musk win game.
I hope we can Doge that bullet/rocket.
Isn’t a rocket just a big, Elongated bullet?
I hope we do notsee a loss.
You must be Putin me on with these puns.
At least you took your time and didn’t go Russian into this sub-thread.
We’ll be ok if we just layoff the turnovers and dictate the pace of play.
IIRC, I don’t believe we’ve been more than 3 games over .500 this season? I think we were at 23-20 after the game against Golden State.
JV vs Steven Adams could be HUGE!
&ct=g
I’m expecting the typical Kings performance against a good team – fall behind big early, rally a bit in the second and/or 3rd Q, then flail and fail at the end.
Just my personal opinion, but VanVleet is the kind of PG this Kings could really use. He’s steady, doesn’t force things, doesn’t require a bunch of shots but is respectable from deep, has reasonable usage, and plays pretty solid defense. Had the Kings not traded Fox, he would have been a nice addition to a possible trade from Houston. Water under the bridge now.
So whoever the Kings find to play PG next year (fingers crossed), I think one in the mold of VanVleet would be a nice fit.
Still predicting Trae Young and change for Monk, DDR, Carter and a future first. The Kings front office LOVES offensive counting stats players. Be ready, my friend.
Trae Young is an awfully high bar for this front office. I’m bracing for Jordan Poole.
Trae is the Fun Size version of Fox with worse defense.
Whatever size Trae is….he has won games.
Trae Young is this team’s Mike Bibby.
With that trade you easily slide keon into the lineup and your defense actually improves.
trae/keon/lavine/murray/sabonis >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> monk/ddr/lavine/murray/sabonis
Keon can slide in now but there is a reason it does not happen.
Yeah they don’t want to bruise egos of monk or ddr
As much as I’ve gone out on a limb to align myself with you here lately, I could hardly be less enthused with this idea.
Keon might go in that deal and Carter stays. They have not had any time to see what Carter is. Not usual to get rid of first rounder so soon without knowing what he is as a player.
Only if atl requires him, no shot kings elect to give up keon over carter
Counting stat players like Davion Mitchell?
$45mil. left on an expiring contract for a barely above average starting PG? Hard pass!
Oh boy, Sabonis got a hamstring injury. Wonder how long he may end up missing.
At least we have JV this time around.
Having Domas insurance is nice
Not only one insurance policy. Multiple policies in place now.
Not having a balanced roster for two years cost us Sabonis. Glad we have one now. Great to see a bench with bigs instead of small guards without any playing experience.
We got better in the last few weeks.
Keon Ellis
He’s so absurdly good given his contract. I really hope we can re-sign him.
A CBA guru can correct me if I’m wrong, but we can sign him via full Bird after next year.
I’m no guru, but I’m pretty sure you are correct.
I think so, too. My only concern is that spotrac (which is usually very reliable) lists Keon as an unrestricted free agent for the 26-27 season. I’m hoping that’s just a technicality because the Kings have not yet officially picked up his option for next season.
I believe 3 year contracts that go to expiration end in unrestricted free-agency, but the team can extend after 2 using Bird rights, and Full-Bird rights in Ellis’ case, if I’m right.
LTB!!
Didn’t get to watch, but that’s a good win over a quality team. Certainly having Domas out is not going to help this team, but I do wonder if they might get a little better defensively with JV playing center.
Good scoreboard night. Mavs lost. Dubs lost.
Keon Ellis, man. And a major JV hat tip.
Looks like trying the 6th-10th spot will be a mixture of the Clippers, Warriors, Mavericks, Wolves, and the Kings (barring some unexpected resurgence from the Suns).
6-10 is a dead heat right now. Sac needs to secure the tie-breaker in Dallas tomorrow. Then the Nugs on Wednesday, Denver is always a tough ask.
Still got one more game against Golden State too coming up mid-March. If we win that, we’ll have the tiebreaker against them.
Ken Ellis and JV were spectacular.
It is still a crime that Ellis won’t crack the 30 minutes. For Christie sake, Doug!
I think the Kings’ early first quarter success played a part in Keon not getting as many minutes as he might have. DC decided to stay with the starters (other than JV for the injured Domas) as they were building up that 21 – 7 lead. After JV, the first subs didn’t enter until about 4-1/2 minutes were left in the quarter, about 2 or 3 minutes later than Keon has been entering recently.
Let’s go Kings Herald. Toss your tanks away and help push this thing into the playoffs.
We’re so spoiled
A young core of Sengun, Hali, and Fox would have been something good me thinks. We were short on undersized point guards at the time though, so I suppose I can see Monte’s logic.
Good win though. New KANGZ team is starting to seem not so terrible after all. Hopefully they can keep it up
I figured we’d fall behind big early, rally in the middle quarters, and then lose it at the end. The team completely flipped that script around on Hou. It was an impressive win against a good team. The Kings were the better team in this game, not dominant but still clearly the better team throughout.
Sim buellar?
maybe biggest win of the season and 12 hrs of silence here??
Greg and Co. pre-wrote the post-game review to read like a season obituary, and now they are nursing their hang-overs with anti-depressants. I can’t wait to see them show back up on Monday and try to paint a pretty picture after painting themselves into a corner.
I love it. It’s weird that it seems every show/podcast is doom and gloom except duece and mo and whitey/drapes
I’ve been moving all weekend and have zero time to watch a game. You think I care that much about being wrong? You must be new here, I know I’m wrong constantly. I’m sorry that the writers here have lives and on rare occasion that causes gaps or delays in coverage.
Moving is the WORST!
I hope your back is ok and you have had enough Advil and beer to soothe the physical and mental pain. Most importantly I hope you and your family settle in and enjoy your new home.
Ugh! I hate moving! Nothing to apologize for, I’m just blowing off steam, and talking smack. You guys work hard going out of your way to keep us entertained, and I sit back, play the deletant, and complain. Don’t take me too seriously. And thanks, really.
I have not paid much attention to what you write but lately it has been trash.
The doom & gloom crowd who doesn’t want to recognize that roster has probably improved and Kings now fighting for 6th place instead of 10th …. Although they’re doing it on the fly and half the roster is new, these wins don’t fit the narrative.
Let’s all come back at the end of the season, leave our excuses behind and see where we’re at.
Let’s all enjoy the season and watching this new balanced roster play basketball.
In theory we all want this team to win. In every group there are outliers though.
100%
Chill, amigo. The team is 3 games above .500 and likely just lost Sabonis for an extended amount of time. FWIW, the Kings were 9 games above .500 through 59 games last season and where coming off a victory over the first place T-Wolves.
These guys need to go 16-7 the rest of the way, against one of the hardest strength of schedules and possibly without Domas, just to mach last season’s record. Let it play out before calling folks out.
Playing poorly if one of their best players is out for an extended time would certainly be informative. The old shtick about how good Fox was and looking back to old FO mistakes, of which there are too many to count, has also grown tiresome.
Biggest mistakes over the last 7 years were likely committing to Fox over Luka and then Hali, so the dig out might not be seamless. But yeah, let’s check back at end of season and compare notes.
The fresh roster is so damn refreshing. We have forwards and a very good center to play behind Sabonis.
We have a team built to be a team instead of roster built around singular player.
Would you expect the same silence if the Kings would have lost the game?
You really think there is some conspiracy or an unwillingness by the contributors on this site because the Kings won?? Seriously?
Nope. Just that the pessimism on the site, in general, since the trade has ramped up. And a significant win against a team above the Kings in the standings has no game thread, post game thread, or recap.
The previous 2 wins were viewed as empty because of the competition, and we were all waiting for a them to do it against a “real team”. Alas, they did just that, and nothing.
Or it could just be because it’s the weekend of folks are busy with their lives. I recall plenty of discussion after the Kings beat the Celtics in Boston without Fox, but whatever.
We’re so spoiled
Conspiracy theory of the day for the new thread delay.
“This is what happens when everyone makes fun of Musk in today’s America”
Could it be that DOGE fired the TKH staff? Or took away their posting capabilities.
As long as I can blame Greg…
If it makes you feel better, I was really pessimistic about the team before the trade.
Zero chance lol
Why does it hurt to see this team win?
Our bench is clearly better and Lavine is anything but a bust. We are a decent basketball team. That is better than the bad team we were for the last four months. Enjoy the Kings winning.
You can still see Fox play in San Antonio. He did not vanish from Earth.
The unpredictability of a (hopefully) .500 team with the worst owner in sports cannot be smoothed out with a surprise win versus Houston.
At the end of the season I’m sure there will be enough optimism to think next year will be better, and enough pessimism so think nothing has changed.
Either way I would bet the farm when you zoom out to 20,000ft and look for a parade you’ll see nothing but irrelevancy in Sacramento.
That reality wasn’t different a month ago or two months ago, and life would get even harder over the next few years for any Kings fan hoping for a 50-win season or a parade if Fox did sign that $165MM/3 year extension offer before the season started.
I understand why peeps were hopeful that Fox might be a difference maker and team was on the rise after the surprise of 22-23 season, but 1.5 years later, after watching a 40-win team that was mostly going sideways or backwards …. I guess I just don’t understand the handwringing. The team got better, but the owner isn’t better than the McGoofs — what to do?
Out of left field; am I the only one who noticed how much Luke Loucks looks like Volodymir Zelenskiy?
This is obviously knee-jerk, but with how bad Domas has been over the last few, and now seeing JV step-up playing better than my expectations for Sabonis, I can’t help but begin to wonder, given the salaries involved: what could a Domas trade bring this off-season? $33mil. in salary relief to start… and assets?
Shhhh, quite you!
Vivek: “Poole? Poole?! Jordan Poole!! Poole Rocks!
BREAKING: Kings trade Domantas Sabonis for Jordan Poole, Richaun Holmes, and seven 2nd rounder pick swaps.
I didn’t want to ask, but the raw data, and results, themselves beg the question, even on a small sample size. If Sac goes on a run w/o Domas against this brutal strength of schedule, we may need to address the conversation. Nearly $44 mil. for a center in todays NBA is tough to justify, especially if he isn’t making annual post-season appearances. Domas is almost an unique offensive talent, and terribly under-appreciated league wide, but his deficiencies are obvious.
Of course the conversation is premature, but If they stay hot, a package of picks and a young promising center, (think Kel’el, Missi) along with cap-space becomes, at least, a bit attractive. Just sayin’.
For sure, it would be a discussion worth having if it plays out that way. No one is untouchable on a very average NBA team.
George Karl burner account confirmed!
Ha! I wondered when the “The team looks better with JV instead of Domas.” comments would show up.
I didn’t want to be the one to bring it up, but evidently I wasn’t the only one who dared entertain the thought.
I will say, JV looked absolutely gassed a few times last night. I wonder if his 32 year old legs just don’t have it anymore to be getting starter type of minutes. His minutes have decreased for 4 straight years, but yeah, he looked good on both ends of the court.
Just a detail, JV has averaged over 30 minutes just once in his career, and that was 4 years ago. Sabonis has averaged over 34 MPG for the past 7 straight years. It will be interesting to see how Christie uses JV while Domas is out.
Just start Keon at C.
All our problems will be solved.
Positionless Basketball! Or go full Vivek and just start Domas and he can cherry pick. 4 on 5!!
Lol Totally!
Great points! thanks
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