Kings Faithful
Starter
Small ball lineup was a direct response to the lineup the Bucks were sporting. It worked out pretty well too....thats what good coaching does for you.
The big 3 were all great but i gotta give it to Tyreke for hitting those clutch free throws ti ice the game.
Small ball lineup was a direct response to the lineup the Bucks were sporting. It worked out pretty well too....thats what good coaching does for you.
Thornton (B-) Was a black hole for most of the night, seemed to lose control of the ball alot, but hit some tough shots down the stretch, still they are hard shots that were created out of nothing, if they don't go in they are terrible shots.
With DMC being fouled out, who else are we supposed to play? 4 of our top 6 players are guards. We need a real SF.
Jimmer (C) Looks a little lost out there,and its hurting his shooting, just doesn't seem to have a connection with anyone other than Cousins.
The one thing I did like from Jimmer was he wasn't picking up his dribble as much once he got into the lane. He either went up for a shot, passed immediately, and once kept his dribble alive and brought the ball back out. Much better in that aspect today. Definitely still feeling out his game and his style, but you can see him evolving a little. Still needs to be a little more forceful with his passes though.
Evans (A) - Best game of the season for him, actually kicked out to shooters when driving, could have had a triple double if shooters hit their shot, still they are open shots and have to go down at some point.
Cousins (B+) Absolutely dominated the boards whenever he was in, he is like a vacuum on the boards. Could have had 30+ points on this frontline, foul trouble hurt him, the last foul was a terrible call, needs to improve on reading double teams and finding open shooters.
Thornton (B-) Was a black hole for most of the night, seemed to lose control of the ball alot, but hit some tough shots down the stretch, still they are hard shots that were created out of nothing, if they don't go in they are terrible shots.
Salmons (C) Terrible offensive night, his shot is off, didn't we bring him in to be a spot up 3pt shooter? ball rotations come to a dead halt with him, hit a couple shots down the stretch and played great d down the stretch.
Jimmer (C) Looks a little lost out there,and its hurting his shooting, just doesn't seem to have a connection with anyone other than Cousins.
JT (B) played solid, without doing much on the stat sheet, held Gooden in check down the stretch.
Hickson (C) He has hands like Kwame Brown, but he hustles, he is also a black hole when he gets the ball in the post.
Smart (A) Liked his rotation, kept the best players on, in a MUST WIN night. hopefully Outlaw get demoted. he sucks. Did something at half time to motivate this team.
hes just being honest, if we play like this with bogut we lose. if we play any half decent team we lose. If we had a full training camp under a new coach i would be optimistic, but hes pretty much gonna be teaching on the fly, were not gonna see much change in our offense, other than hopefully pushing the ball more. In the halfcourt it will continue to be stagnant one on one play.
hes just being honest, if we play like this with bogut we lose. if we play any half decent team we lose. If we had a full training camp under a new coach i would be optimistic, but hes pretty much gonna be teaching on the fly, were not gonna see much change in our offense, other than hopefully pushing the ball more. In the halfcourt it will continue to be stagnant one on one play.
There are nights where it is plainly evident that Demarcus is just better than everyone else on the court. Tonight was such a night.
19 pts, 15 rebounds. If he could give us that every night... !!!
it was a fun 2.5 quarters of basketball for sure. don't get to see comebacks like that very often.
the assist to turnover thing got us way behind (and is a scary reoccurring issue), but defense and grit and sheer will brought us back. it's great to see that they didn't just throw their hands up and give in. some good maturity.
go kings.
it was a fun 2.5 quarters of basketball for sure. don't get to see comebacks like that very often.
the assist to turnover thing got us way behind (and is a scary reoccurring issue), but defense and grit and sheer will brought us back. it's great to see that they didn't just throw their hands up and give in. some good maturity.
and speaking of which, despite the recent things we "hear" about couisns' immaturity, from what i SEE, i think he has been noticeably more composed in games so far this year. he handled that blatantly wrong 6th foul very well. better than *i* did as a fan even. for such a passionate and emotional player at such a critical time in the game, he was super professional. shows growth, and I'm proud of him.
go kings.
I'll take the win, but the Kings completely lucked out. You're not going to win too many games committing more TOs than assists. Still a lot of selfish basketball being played out there.
The Bucks helped the Kings with some bizarre unforced TOs in the fourth. They also can't hit their FTs and they're playing without Bogut.
One thing I know, the Kings are not going to win too many games playing like this. Definitely need to improve in all aspect.
Smart could have put in Hickson for Cousins and have three guards + Hickson and JT. That lineup would have made sense from a traditional bball standpoint and also since the Bucks were using a very standard Gooden/Ilyasova big men frontline. But Smart deliberately went small by inserting Salmons.
* DMC needs to do something about his fouling. He has to be on the floor to be dominant, and he reaches out with his arms WAY too much. I also initially thought the 6th foul was BS, until I saw the later replay - he DID stick his arms out, at an angle - his arms were not straight up, and that's supposed to be an automatic foul (tho the refs aren't consistent with the call).
The amazing thing is that that was only in about half a game's worth of minutes. If Cuz learns to stay out of his own way, there's no telling how good he can be- especially since he seems to have discovered magic defensive skills over the summer.
And you saw all this in your crystal ball? Or perhaps you have the ability to read minds, and you've read Keith Smarts mind. Where do you people come from?
Dude, Smart literally took over a few hours before the game and hasn't run a practice yet. What exactly did you expect Smart to do and what exactly did you expect from the team?!
This game is as good as we could have expected and in a lot of ways perfect on so many levels. Fall behind 20, have a coach involved in the game, yelling out instructions, calling timely time-outs, tightening rotations and all of a sudden things started clicking, confidence grew and bob's your uncle! He gets the first win as a coach, the players start believing in him and what he is preaching, players get some much needed confidence and belief back.
Did you all of a sudden expect us to run the sort of offence we ran with Divac-Webber-Peja-Christie-Bibby?! Give it a bit of time and it will turn around. Whether it turns with Smart is yet to be seen but we will obviously run things differently than we did with Westphal.
And you saw all this in your crystal ball? Or perhaps you have the ability to read minds, and you've read Keith Smarts mind. Where do you people come from?