The Sacramento Kings were unable to defeat the Miami Heat in South beach tonight, losing 123-100.

Although the Kings actually didn’t play that bad in the beginning, starting the game with a 6-0 lead, they were not good enough to compete with the Heat. Miami was more physical and efficient on both sides of the ball. However, where they truly dominated was on the boards. In the first half alone, Bam Adebayo scored 12 points and had 11 rebounds. No Kings player had more than four in that half. They out rebounded the Kings 25 to 17.

Davion Mitchell with his patented stepback 3. Look at how much he shifted his defender and the space he created. pic.twitter.com/qcx4cqkKl3

— Kings Film Room (@SacFilmRoom) March 29, 2022

The Kings were also unable to hit their shots in the first half. As a team they shot 39% from the field, 29% from deep, and a measly 57% from the line. Davion Mitchell had pretty good first half scoring nine points and getting five assists. However, he had the lowest +/- on the team at half at -22.

The score at half was 41-57.

After the half, Miami came out on fire. They increased their lead to 25 points at the end of the third quarter and were able to hover around that number for the rest of the game. Adebayo, Jimmy Butler, and Tyler Herro all scored 20+ points. Adebayo also had 15 rebounds. It was complete bully ball all game. Miami outrebounded the Kings 47-32 and assisted the ball 10 more times.

Mitchell finished with 21 points and nine assists. The rest of the team played somewhat average, however Damian Jones had 15 points on 6/8 from the field. CHimezie Metu was one point and one rebound shy of a double-double.

In all fairness, this game was on Miami’s radar as a bounce back game to get their minds right. The Kings just unfortunately had to play them at this particular moment in the season.

If it is any consolation, this loss only continues to help Sacramento’s lottery chances.

Miami covered the DraftKings Sportsbook spread of -12.5 as well as the over of 217.5 points.