Wooooo, what a painful way to lose a quite winnable game against a typically brilliant team. The Kings worked so hard from tip to buzzer, and if not for a few goofy bounces on those free throws they'd have had a marquee victory in ARCO. As it is, it's a marquee moral victory. We love those!

If this loss, a game in which the Kings held a late, brief but real lead and had two chances to tie the game from the free throw line, if this is a microcosm of the balance of this season, well then, giddy up. This team fights, and while it's not quite there, it's almost there, there enough to keep these interesting (to say the least), interesting enough to make contenders sweat when @SAC pops up on the schedule.

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Evans's final line: 17 points on 5-13 shooting, 11 rebounds, seven assists, one steal, one turnover. The man he marked, Rondo? Four points on 1-6 shooting, seven rebounds, six assists, three steals, three turnovers. Advantage: Rookie.

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The single biggest difference between the Kings on Tuesday night and the Kings we've seen over the past two months: the interior defense was astoundingly outstanding. Boston shot 11-23 at the rim. The C's usually shoot 65 percent at the rim, and Kings opponents typically shoot 65 percent at the rim. Had Boston shot 65 percent at the rim Tuesday night, they would have hit 15 of 23 shots, an extra eight points. So, um, interior defense matters! Keep it up, kids.