Cuz had no legs. We played the game stupid tactically, and without heart or focus on the floor. We scored 108pts and got blown out. Makes me wonder why management ever let Keith Smart go if that's just what they wanted to force us to be again. A month ago this would have been a clash of powers and styles. Now it was just once again a beatdown of a lowly lottery team by an elite team yawning between dunks and layups. Welcome home Kings fans.
Boxscore
Stats: 37min 13pts (4-14, 1-2, 4-5) 9reb 3ast 1stl 1blk 2TO
Gay ( C- ) -- I did not get the chance to watch this game until after it was over, with full knowledge of the outcome and the box score. Rudy's play was better than his box score, but still not good. Offensively, Rudy was just off. He was missing his open shots, shots at the rim, and his usual contested jumpers from mid-range. Four for fourteen is not going to get you a good grade. He also had a few turnovers, but not because he was doing something stupid, just from good plays made by Warriors players. For instance, in the second, Rudy pulled down a strong defensive board (he was doing a great job crashing the boards all night against the Warriors' diminutive frontcourt) and Iguodala just made a great play on the ball to knock it loose from behind. Rudy himself made some great plays on defense, including absolutely crushing a lay-in attempt by Ezeli on one of the few good defensive sequences of the night for the Kings. This does not make up for a poor shooting night, but it does give me a reason to not give him a D for the game. --Hadlowe
Stats: 20min 6pts (3-3, 0-0, 0-0) 4reb 0ast 0stl 2blk 1TO
Thompson ( C- ) -- for about 30 seconds of this one you ever so briefly had some hope for one of JT's old work over the Warriors games as he immediately ran the floor and took a quick pass from Collison for a layup and the first basket of the game. He added a good block to save a hoop. And then...poof again. He was briefly spotted doing a good job vs. Lee down the stretch of the half and finally hit another shot with an open 17ft facer in the final 30 seconds of the half. Came up with 1 more shot and a little hustle boardwork in the early 4th. But my lord was he completely 100% and in all ways ineffective shutting down the rim to the Warriors. Was frequently the guy who took over at center when Cuz went out, and if nothing else Corbin's attempts to manipulate that rotation have been a good idea. Well, at least on paper. Because today what you got was a tired sloppy Cuz out there again playing the 23-3 Warriors just about even. He was a -2 in his 30 minutes on the court, meaning if we could have kept him out there for 18 more at that same pace we'd be in here now talking about buzzer beaters and game winning attempts. Meanwhile JT was a staggering -32 in his 20 minutes of action. -32, and half those minutes came with Cuz (-2 n the floor). Everytime Cuz left and JT took over it was a complete and rapid disaster. There's nothing exceptionally bad in JT's minor little numbers here, but holy layup drill. --Brick
Stats: 30min 22pts (9-19, 0-0, 4-6) 8reb 6ast 1stl 1blk 2TO
Cousins ( C- ) -- No Bogut tonight so DMC started against Festus Ezieli an athletic and young center who gave him quite a workout. Demarcus started off forcing up some shots in early minutes including one air ball. Then he begins to get position on Ezeli for rebounds on several possessions. Misses a layin when triple teamed but at 7 min mark finally hits a nice 19ft jumper and settles down a bit. When Maurice Speights replaces Ezeli DMC powers down lane thru him. Then hits an elbow jumper. JT replaces Cuz at 4:25;. DMC starts the 2nd w/Omri, Sessions, Gay and Nik. David Lee is on Cuz so he takes him deep for easy layin, then hits baseline jumper and draws charge from Barnes. Forgets to guard Speights on transisition defense a few times for easy buckets by the Warriors. Cuz doing average things, seems a bit tired. JT in for DMC at 4:10 mark. In the first possession of the 3rd quarter DMC passes out of double team to Ben for a 3. But Warriors, primarily Curry, are killing the Kings with Pick-and-Rolls which the Kings/DMC have yet to defeat yielding many easy 2’s by Warriors. Ezeli defending DMC pretty well and it goes back and forth between them at both ends. The good spacing and spread offense the Warriors use is difficult for DMC as he does not yet have his back-to-back legs. Speights comes in for Ezeli at 6:30 mark with Kings on a mini-run dropping deficit from 23 down to 12. Demarcus making good drives to basket but gets fouled most every time. Speights now has 4 fouls and Ezeli 3 trying to guard him but he picks up his own 4th foul at 2:10 mark of 3rd so JT replaces him. Again he seems tired. JT starts 4th with DMC coming in at about 8:30 mark. Warriors are up by 24. Does his patented spin down lane for finger roll for 2 but Ezeli beats him at other end. Landry in for Cuz about 5 min mark with DMC making no significant contribution or stopping the Warriors in the paint who had 66 points there with Kings only getting 46. In 30 min, DMC shoots 9/19+4/6 FT for 22 pts with 8 reb, 6 ast, and only 2 TO. A nice typical set of stats but nothing special and poor defense against the PNR. The minus is getting beat by Ezeli on both ends a few times and having a very average, for Demarcus, game against the best team in the NBA. --Cruz
Stats: 33min 11pts (4-8, 3-6, 0-0) 2reb 3ast 1stl 0blk 1TO
McLemore ( C+ ) -- This was a tough one to grade, and a year ago Ben might have gotten a B -. But because of his recent play, more is expected of him. However, he went long periods of time without touching the ball on offense, which is a shame because he was efficient when he did. On the whole, he did a decent job of defending Thompson. He got off on a sour note when Thompson crossed him over and went baseline for a layup. But for the most part, when Ben was on Thompson, he made him work hard for everything he got. Ben also started by missing his first shot, a three pointer from the right elbow. But then made a nice pass to Collison on a fast break who stopped and popped a fourteen footer, giving Ben his first of three assists on the night. He finally hit a three pointer before going to the bench at around the 2:30 mark of the 1st quarter. He re-entered the game at the 8:33 mark of the 2nd quarter, and strangely, he literally didn't touch the ball on offense until there were 44 seconds left in the 1st half, when he drove the right baseline and scored on a reverse layup. Ben opened the 2nd half by hitting a three pointer on a pass from Cousins. A play that was repeated a bit later in the half. He ended with 11 points, but only 2 boards. I kept hearing from Jerry and Grant, that Cousins and Gay needed someone else to step up and help with the scoring, but that's hard to do if the ball never comes your way. Still too much isolation play, but its hard to fault Cousins who ended up with 6 assists. It's tough playing a back to back against the team with the best record in the NBA. --Baja
Stats: 32min 17pts (7-14, 2-4, 1-2) 2reb 5ast 2stl 0blk 4TO
Collison ( C ) -- this was a solid statistical outing that I think was actually less solid if you started to scratch the surface a bit. Started right off picking off a pass thrown right to him under the hoop and racing down the other way to deliver an assist to JT at the rim. But then got a little wild, missing a long three, getting involved in a turnover up top with JT, and in maybe the biggest story of the game for me -- our idiot coach, perhaps with strings attached to his arms and legs, was screaming "pick it up! pick it up!" every time down the floor, actually encouraging us to speed up the pace against the one team in the league that wants to play with pace. Which is moronic, but maybe Vivek wanted to impress the guys up in the Golden State box laughing at him. In any case, DC ended up being the vessel through which this ruinous strategy was inflicted on us, and while he's a very quick guard and got several hits out of it, in general we played right into their hands, the game was scrambled and open, DC was unusually wild with TOs and forced shots, and he was only 2-7 in the first half. He rattled a three in and out at the 2min mark of the half when we could have cut it to 6, illusory as that spread felt. He was better after half, or at least he hit more shots. Hit a three to cap a mini-run in the 3rd...to get the lead back down to only 14. When Cuz's shot was blocked right to him standing under the hoop, he caught it and laid it up to make it 12. But while Curry felt like he had his team doing exactly what they wanted in only half a night, it never felt like DC had any control at all (to be fair our own style was deemed illegal by our own front office, so not sure what DC could do but follow his coach's idiotic bleatings) --Brick
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