Kings vs. Warriors: A Fascinating Game for all the Wrong Reasons

The Sacramento Kings return home tonight to face the Golden State Warriors, again, just days after Draymond Green (falsely) called the organization out for tanking. The viral nature of Draymond’s postgame comments are partly responsible for sparking a league investigation into the Kings’ tanking efforts, and placed Sacramento in a ton of embarrassing headlines about the whole ordeal. Should make for an interesting contest tonight!

Who: Sacramento Kings (21-59) vs. Golden State Warriors (37-43)
Where: Golden 1 Center, Sacramento, CA
When: 7:00 PM PT / 10:00 PM ET
Watch: NBCSCA / League Pass

Akis covered this entire ordeal in more depth here, but as it relates to this game, It’ll be interesting to see how the Kings play it. Doug Christie hates tanking. He hates the idea of it. He hates being called out for it. Well, Draymond not only accused Christie of tanking, but also caused a large segment of the NBA mediasphere to blast Christie for his late game error. The Kings are once again an NBA laughing stock, but for the first time, Christie is at the center of it all. Doug is competitive. He’s going to want payback. He’s going to try to beat the Warriors, if that’s even possible with this broken down roster.

To make matters more fascinating, the Utah Jazz are playing in a tank-off with the Memphis Grizzlies tonight. Both teams need to lose. Whoever wins will directly hurt their draft position. A Utah win would be huge for the Kings, and nearly lock Sacramento into 4th. But will Christie’s pride get in the way of what’s best for the Kings organization?

Sad but true: this might be the most important and most interesting game of the entire season for the Kings. And of course it’s against the Warriors.

Prediction: Kings 114, Warriors 109.