Field Level Media
17 Nov 2023, 10:25 GMT+10
(Photo credit: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)
The surging Sacramento Kings look to extend their four-game winning streak and continue their recent success on the road against San Antonio when they visit the Spurs on Friday in an NBA in-season tournament game.
Sacramento is 1-0 in the West Group C standings of the in-season tournament and the Spurs are 0-2.
The Kings opened a six-game road trip with a 125-110 win over the Los Angeles Lakers on Wednesday. Domantas Sabonis led Sacramento with a season-high 29 points and grabbed 16 rebounds, while De'Aaron Fox and Kevin Huerter scored 28 apiece, the latter matching his season high by making six 3-pointers.
Huerter said afterward that the win set the table for success for the road trip.
"It's great to get off to a good start," Huerter said. "If we can take care of business, we'll put ourselves in a good place. We just have to keep going. It's super early in the season, but it feels like we're catching a rhythm a little bit. I think we're connected to what we want to do defensively. We have really good team defense right now."
Sacramento never trailed, leading by as many as 20 points in the first quarter and by 72-59 at halftime. Los Angeles pulled within single digits late in the fourth quarter before the Kings put away the win.
"For us to come in here and get this one to start this road trip off the right way, it was a really good win for us," Kings coach Mike Brown said.
Fox has scored 28 points in consecutive outings after his return from missing five games with an ankle injury.
San Antonio has dropped six straight, including a 123-87 loss at Oklahoma City on Tuesday. Julian Champagnie and Zach Collins scored 13 points apiece to lead the Spurs, while Devin Vassell had 12. San Antonio played without starting forward Keldon Johnson (right knee soreness) and backup point guard Tre Jones, who missed his second consecutive game with a hamstring injury.
Rookie phenom Victor Wembanyama had a season-low eight points for the Spurs on 4-of-15 shooting, but he finished with a game-high 14 rebounds. San Antonio committed 25 turnovers that led to 23 OKC points.
"We got a long-term vision," Wembanyama said. "We're not close but we're on the right path. It's going to be a long-term project. We are experimenting with some stuff. We got a lot to adjust to."
San Antonio was up three before allowing the Thunder to score the final 13 points of the first half. The Spurs had no response after the break as they were outscored by 15 in the third quarter.
"I realize it's a young team but two things have to happen," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said after the loss. "At some point, you have to get tired of getting your (expletive) kicked and second, you have to understand it's a 48-minute game. We played 22 good minutes in the first half. The last two minutes of the first half we turned it over three times and executed nothing."
--Field Level Media
Get a daily dose of Oklahoma Star news through our daily email, its complimentary and keeps you fully up to date with world and business news as well.
Publish news of your business, community or sports group, personnel appointments, major event and more by submitting a news release to Oklahoma Star.
More InformationRALEIGH, North Carolina: After a decade of discussions and hesitations, North Carolina has expanded Medicaid coverage by offering government-funded health ...
The U.S. has supplied Israel with scores of BLU-109 bunker-buster bombs since October 7, the Wall Street Journal has reported, ...
WASHINGTON D.C.: This week, the Biden administration announced a proposal by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that would require U.S. ...
TOKYO, Japan: Japan's space agency recently fell victim to a cyberattack, but reassuringly, the compromised information did not pertain to ...
MOUNT PLEASANT, Michigan: This week, a judge sentenced a Michigan man who kept his dead wife's body in a freezer ...
ATLANTA, Georgia: After two consecutive years of declines mainly caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, babies born in the U.S. in ...
NEW YORK, New York - U.S. stocks spent most of Tuesday meandering, with the major indices closing out the day ...
DEARBORN, Michigan: This week, Ford said a six-week United Auto Workers (UAW) strike cut its sales by some 100,000 vehicles ...
WASHINGTON D.C.: This week, the Biden administration adopted a new rule aimed at reducing methane emissions, which targets the role ...
AUSTIN, Texas: During an event held this week in Austin, Texas, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the electric vehicle (EV) ...
NEW YORK, New York - U.S. stocks closed mixed on Monday following on from last week's volatility."Digestion is the word ...
REDMOND, Washington: Microsoft President Brad Smith said there is no chance of super-intelligent artificial intelligence (AI) being developed within the ...