For the second straight season, after 54 games, the Sacramento Kings are 31-23.
However, Sacramento ended a 16-year record of missing the playoffs last season, finishing third in the Western Conference. The Kings’ home game against the San Antonio Spurs on Thursday night comes just sixth in the Western Conference this season.
The Spurs and Kings, who are ranked last in the Western Conference, are playing their first game since the All-Star break.
With 28 games remaining in the regular season, Sacramento is 1 1/2 games out of a postseason berth in the top six.
The play-in round is for teams who place seventh through tenth, and as Kings player De’Aaron Fox stated on Tuesday, “We don’t want to be in it.” “In the play-in round, no team desires to be. That, in my opinion, has increased the league’s level of competition.”
With six teams possessing a 60 percent winning percentage, the West is undoubtedly competitive. The fact that the reigning NBA champion Denver Nuggets only had the fourth-best mark is another illustration of toughness.
With four losses in six games going into the All-Star break, Sacramento was in poor form. Play concluded before the break on February 14 with a 102-98 away victory, one of the two victories against the Nuggets.
Fox found a large dose of encouragement in those victories as the team gets ready to embark on the final third of the season.
“I feel confident,” Fox said. “Obviously, the last game that we played, I think we did a great job on the defensive side of the ball. So continue to focus on that and control the things that we can control.”
Fox wasn’t selected to play in the All-Star Game despite averaging a career-high 26.8 points per game and already setting a career best with 141 3-pointers.
Fox has recorded six of his 12 career 40-point outings this season, and one was a 43-point effort in a 129-120 road win over the Spurs on Nov. 17. He also had eight rebounds and seven assists as the Kings beat San Antonio for the sixth time in the past seven meetings.
Spurs rookie big man Victor Wembanyama had 27 points and nine rebounds in his first career outing against Sacramento.
Wembanyama has lived up to his billing as the No. 1 overall pick in the 2023 draft by averaging 20.5 points, 10 rebounds and an NBA-leading 3.2 blocked shots per game (156 total).
In San Antonio’s second-to-last game before the All-Star break, Wembanyama blocked 10 shots (most in the NBA this season) to go with 27 points and 14 rebounds for his second career triple-double in a 122-99 road win over the Toronto Raptors on Feb. 12.
Wembanyama didn’t make the All-Star team roster but was in Indianapolis to compete in the Rising Stars game and the Skills Challenge.
He said the trip was well worth it.
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