Oh, what I wouldn’t give for a do-over of the last nine seconds of Monday’s game against the Denver Nuggets. It was an exciting game; after being down 23 at one point in the first half, the Kings outscored the Nuggets 35-21 to take the lead in the third quarter. I’ve watched many Kings games over the years where the Kings were winning by double digits, and I did not feel comfortable; games where I just knew they were going to blow the lead and lose. This was not one of those games. The pace of this game was fast, maybe a little wild; the Nuggets were starting to get frustrated, and you could see it. I really thought we were going to win that game. But as you probably guessed by my opening sentence, we did not. After seven lead changes in the last two minutes alone, the Kings had the ball, down one with nine seconds left. They got the ball to DeMar DeRozan down under the basket, and he somehow fumbled it; it looked like he thought he already had a hold on it when he went up for the layup, but he didn’t. He was able to recover it and got a shot off, but he missed it, and the Kings lost 130-129. It was heartbreaking!
Luckily, the game against the New Orleans Pelicans had a different outcome. It was a fairly close game most of the time, and even with the Kings up by 12 early in the fourth quarter, the Pelicans made a game of it. But Domantas Sabonis scored a season-high 32 points and matched his season-high 20 rebounds, and the Kings beat the Pelicans 111-109. At this point, before Monday’s game against the Nuggets, the Kings had won three straight games and four out of their last five. You can’t win them all, and we are still doing better this December, so I’m going to stay positive.
Monday’s game was the first of a five-game home stand, which is somewhat concerning because the Kings are actually worse at home than they are on the road. There are various theories out there as to why the Kings are better on the road: complacency at home, not having a real team leader, and coaching. But I think it’s because the Kings thrive under pressure. We do have two of the most clutch players in the league in DeRozan and De’Aaron Fox, and what is a clutch player anyway? It’s someone who does well when everything is on the line. When the pressure is high, the Kings do well. Even in that game against the Nuggets, they had to go down 23 points before they woke up. So, how do we get them to feel the pressure at home? How do we get them to play with that intensity the whole game? Maybe we need to add someone with more intensity and fierceness to the roster.
Well, they will have a whole week to try to figure it out, starting with two games against the Los Angeles Lakers, on Thursday, December 19th, and Saturday, December 21st. My son and I will be in attendance when the Kings play the Indiana Pacers on the second night of a back-to-back on Sunday, December 22nd, and then they’ll have a little Christmas break before playing the Detroit Pistons next Thursday, December 26th. If we can at least win three out of the five home games, I think we’ll be doing well. Go Kings!