In a shocking, yet somehow unsurprising outcome, your Sacramento Kings defeated the Boston Celtics 108-92 despite no DeMarcus Cousins behind a career game from Darren Collison and massive contributions from the bench.

The Kings starting guard put together a stellar game, scoring 26 points, dishing out 4 assists, and recording 4 steals. Every time Sacramento’s lead began to slip away or the momentum began to change, Collison was there to hit a key shot or make a defensive stop. One could even argue that Darren won the battle of the point guards as Isaiah Thomas put up a respectable 26 points and 7 assists, but the former Pizza Guy struggled down the stretch, scoring only 9 points on 2/7 shooting in the second half.

Once again, Sacramento took advantage of their deep bench as they outscored the Celtics 50-30 behind big performances from Willie Cauley-Stein, Matt Barnes, and Ben McLemore. Our sophomore center continued to show his rapid growth on the offensive end of the floor with 14 points on only 8 shot attempts as well as 5 rebounds and 4 assists. Willie also had one of the top dunks of the year to put an exclamation point on the win while also hitting two clutch free throws when the Celtics tried “Hack-A-Willie” to try to slow down Dave Joerger’s squad late in the fourth quarter. McLemore had two solid halves in a row, scoring 10 points in the first and 7 in the second. Matt Barnes carried the Kings’ offense at times as he was forced to run the backup point guard position due to Ty Lawson’s injury early in the second quarter.

In the end, this game came down to grit, hustle, and defensive intensity and the Kings won all three of those battles. The Celtics average 108.3 points per game on the season, and while Boston managed to score 28 points in the first quarter, Sacramento held them to just 63 points over the final three quarters, including a 5:34 stretch late in the fourth with no field goals allowed. After the Lawson hamstring strain, Sacramento was arguably without their best four players, but Dave Joerger managed to bring in his grit-n-grind plan for one more game.

Game Notes:

For the opponent’s perspective, visit Celtics Blog.