Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
Kingsfans.com Official Gameday Thread
Game 45
Sacramento Kings at Dallas Mavericks
By Stephen Tetsu, also not on the 2014 All-Star Roster.Game 45
Sacramento Kings at Dallas Mavericks
Rudy Gay made his triumphant return from an unfortunate Achilles injury and had to struggle much of the night against a quick reaggrivation of the aforementioned malady and the ball being superglued to his point guard's hand. Despite these obstacles, Gay put up twenty-three points and eclipsed the ten-thousand point mark for his career. All was not well with Rudy's game though. After a series of thunderous dunks, Rudy came up limping and in obvious discomfort during the last quarter. And, after missing an entire week of games, the small forward displayed the usual layer of rust to the tune of five turnovers.
Meanwhile, in IT-Land, IT had the best defensive performance of his career, limiting Michael Conley to a stingy 27 points and a meager 10 assists. On the offensive end, the Pizza Guy displayed the awesome efficiency and unselfishness that is becoming of a top three point guard in the league with 24 points on 21 shots and 5 assists in 38 minutes. With more performances like this, it's only a matter of time before Isaiah enters the conversation for MVP.
Without Demarcus Cousins to contend with them, the Memphis frontcourt wasn't exactly forced to give 100% on the court. Still coming off of his injury, Carl Landry turned in his best performance of his shortened season, putting up 8 points and nine rebounds on five shots. While I'm not exactly a Landry fan, it's not hard to say that he at least gives us another guy to splay on the inside not named JT or Demarcus. (No offense to Quincy Acy or Aaron Gray but they aren't exactly destined to be star interior presences over the course of their careers.)
Meanwhile, Marcus Thornton was the source of much controversy as his apparently lackadaisical defense resulted in the latest of Coach Malone's defensive pushes. Benefitting from this benching was Ben McLemore, who, after months of us complaining about his lack of development, is starting to show some signs of growth. Albeit those signs of growth are him being able to dribble the ball in a straight line and not forgetting to play defense but they are signs nonetheless.
BUt we lost yet again in a similar fashion to just about every single one of our losses over the past several weeks. Heroball. Heroball. Heroball. All we need is the miniature cape. Maybe we can take Nate Robinson's.
Observations
- In non-on the court news, the Sacramento Kings became the first team in the NBA to use a female PA announcer when Jaime Coffee (former Monarchs announcer and KFBK/KSTE newsperson) filled in for an ailing Scott Moak, who missed his first game in 12 years on the job. There was much rejoicing.
- In other non-on the court news, the conceptualized arena design was released to the public.
- In other non-on the court news, STOP is still very incompetent.
Tonight's Game
"Mommy, why is that homeless man on the basketball court?"
After a rash of free agent signings that pretty much rebuilt the entire roster save for Dirk, the ageless Shawn Marion, and the geriatric Vince Carter, the Rick Carlisle-led crew of wiley vets (Jose), lazy over-the-hill vets (Samuel Dalembert), young guys (Jae Crowder and Shane Larkin) and dudes with no knees (DeJuan Blair) has won with a combination of guile and Monte Ellis not being terrible.
On the plus side, none of the Mavs are particularly noted for their defense (save Marion) at this stage in their career, meaning that scoring on them shouldn't really be an issue, especially if Demarcus comes back and is able to provide some sort of push in the middle. On the negative side, their guards are probably going to massacre our guards. At this point, I'd probably be more surprised if their guards DIDN'T set new career records against our guys.
Their big man depth is on the other side of the spectrum. While Blair is solid as always, he's still undersized and completely out of his depth in a matchup with Boogie or even Jason Thompson (who's been surprisingly good guarding Dirk in recent years). Behind him, the Mavs are rocking the lazy, unmotivated ghost of Sam Dalembert and Brendan Wright, who is listed as a center but is at most a PF. Of course, one of their forward slots will be occupied by Dirk, who is many things but skilled post defender is not one of them. If Cuz were healthy, this is a game where he could probably set career numbers. As is, Jason Thompson and Carl Landry are both skilled enough to get theirs in the paint. Just no more Aaron Gray post plays please.
Cuban smash!
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