The Kings' up and down 2006-07 season is hitting new lows now, after the team's fifth consecutive loss Thursday night, in overtime against the Shaq-less Heat at Arco. The loss was exactly the type of game the Kings need to win if they are to challenge for the postseason this year, and as many of us here on the site have said, the team needs to show some serious discipline when it comes to shooting, or they're flat-out not going to win, period.

Approximately one-fifth of the way through the season, the Kings have amassed enough stats to show some basic trends, and we've crunched the numbers:

Skip The Analysis and Download The Stats

The Kings Are Not A Good Shooting Team

It Comes Down To Getting the Ball In the BucketThere's no mystery here. By making a higher percentage of shots, that leads to a higher total number of shots going in, more points and more wins. But let's see what the numbers show…

Note how much more impact a three point shot has on the eventual outcome of a game when compared to free throws. It's night and day.Yes, mixing math and sports can be dangerous. Sometimes the sample size is too small. But it's clear to me that the team needs to focus on making high-percentage shots, and taking the opportunistic three-pointer from pure shooters. It may be fundamental, but so far this season, other teams are getting it through their noggins a lot better than we are.

Want to come up with your own Sactown Stats? Download the Excel document I used for this post and let us know what you've found.