Season Review: Keegan Murray

When the Kings selected Keegan Murray with the 4th overall pick last summer, it was viewed by many as Sacramento playing it safe, drafting for need rather than “best player available”. The Kings themselves were adamant that Murray was the best player available and while it’s still too early to say if they were right, he definitely proved himself to be one of the better rookies in the entire league over the season.

Murray finished the season averaging 12.2 points, 4.6 rebounds, 1.2 assists, 0.8 steals and 0.5 blocks in 29.8 minutes a game. He started 78 of 80 games, as well as all of Sacramento’s playoff games. He was the only rookie in the entire league that had a prominent starting role on a playoff team. His offensive efficiency was also on another level for a rookie, as he set the NBA rookie record for threes made in a season with 206 on 41.1% accuracy. The only players in the entire league to make more three pointers on better accuracy this past season were Klay Thompson, Buddy Hield and Stephen Curry.

That shooting efficiency was incredibly key for a team featuring Domantas Sabonis and De’Aaron Fox, and helped the Kings set a record for offensive efficiency. The Kings also tended to do a lot better when Murray had it going. In the 47 games that Murray played and Sacramento won, he shot 43.8% from distance, whereas he was only at 36.7% in 31 losses. In games where Murray made at least four three pointers, the Kings were 16-5.

Murray’s instant synergy with Domantas Sabonis was a big key in his offensive efficiency. The Kings ran more dribble handoffs than any other team in the league by far and Murray was a big recipient. According to NBA.com’s shot dashboard, 294 of Murray’s 501 total three point attempts were considered wide open (with the closest defender six or more feet away), and he made 46.9% of those attempts.

Murray looked a bit more like a rookie when trying to go into his own offense, but was still surprisingly adept at picking his spots and getting what he wanted. Before looking up the actual stats, I would have said Murray struggled when creating his own looks, but the only rookies last season who were more efficient on pull ups (on a decent number of attempts) were AJ Griffin and Malaki Branham. Murray definitely didn’t try to create his own looks often (60.6% of his total attempts were catch and shoot per NBA.com), but you could see him getting to the midrange more and more as the season went along and getting good looks there. Following a win against the Memphis Grizzlies where Murray flashed a bit more shot creation on his way to 20 points, Coach Mike Brown offered some well earned praise.

“Most people haven’t seen a ton of them, but his pull-up game is going to be outrageous. I’m telling you. Because he’s got just such a great touch. You see glimpses of it in the game. When he aggressively goes into almost any shot you just feel like it’s going to go in because he’s that good of a player. He’s that good of a shooter.”

One aspect of his offensive game that will definitely need to improve however is his toughness going to the basket. While Murray did a good job attacking the rim off cuts, he had a few too many moments where he didn’t go up as hard as he should have and got blocked or fumbled the attempt. His lack of aggression in attacking the rim also meant he had one of the lowest free throw rates on the entire team. But this is another area where Murray has shown glimpses that he can and will improve.

Defensively, Murray was decent in his rookie campaign. The Kings as a team weren’t a particularly good defensive team, but Murray was far from the problem even as a rookie. Murray showed good instincts and effort throughout the season and will get better with experience. He’s got a good foundation to build on, especially on the perimeter where he held opponents to 6.6% worse than the league average when defending the three.

Rebounding was another area where Mike Brown asked for Murray to step up as the season went along and Murray responded. Through the first 30 games of the season, Murray averaged just 3.8 rebounds a game. After getting called out by Mike Brown, he bumped that up to 5.2 a game over the rest of the season.

Murray’s ability to be even-keeled has been much joked about, but it’s also served him well in big moments. In his first three playoff games, the Warriors completely took Murray out of the game (partly due to their focus on eliminating the dribble hand off). He made just three baskets on 13 attempts in those three games. However, he responded with a huge Game 4 in which he scored 23 points on 9-13 from the field and 5-7 from three. While he didn’t score that much again the rest of the series, he also didn’t disappear, scoring at least 10 points over the final three games, including a big 15 points, 12 rebound performance in a pivotal Game 6 that helped keep the Kings from being eliminated.

Aside from De’Aaron Fox and Domantas Sabonis, there is not a player more important to Sacramento’s future than Keegan Murray. Should his game continue to develop, he can become the third star this team desperately needs in order to get over the hump and become true contenders. We won’t know for a while yet if Murray was truly the best available choice at 4th overall, but right now, the Kings have to be pretty happy with how he’s looked.