Key Takeaways: Sacramento Kings Lose Thriller To Pacers

This article will showcase the main notes that I took away from tonight’s Sacramento Kings game against the Indiana Pacers.

It was an entertaining game to watch, but the Sacramento Kings fell short to the Indiana Pacers by a score of 106-103.

Although the purple and white will leave the match with a loss, there were some encouraging notes to take away from their performance, as well as some bad ones.

Scroll down below to see what my main takeaways were from tonight’s entertainment fest.

Key Takeaways

• Willie Cauley-Stein and Buddy Hield anchored the Kings’ offense to start the game. Both guys were able to make their first three shots of the contest which resulted in the pair scoring 15 of the first 17 points for Sacramento. Once the game concluded, Cauley-Stein finished with 19 points and seven rebounds. For Hield, he scored 20 points.
• The Kings shot the ball well throughout the entire game. In the first half, they shot 56% from the floor and 41% from the perimeter. Once the game ended, those numbers remained the almost the same as they shot 54% from the court and 42% from the three-point line.
• Bojan Bogdanovic, no relation to Bogdan, was the Pacers’ leading scorer tonight as he recorded 25 points.
• The ball movement for Sacramento was exceptional tonight as the team relied on multiple guys to score. As a result, the team recorded a total of 27 assists.
• Sacramento as a collective whole made some dime passes tonight that would get Trent Dilfer off his chair, but that did not mean their ball security was good as they turned the ball over a whopping 18 times.
• Bogdan Bogdanovic had a nice game as he recorded 21 points and four assists for the night. As of late, Bogdanovic’s has underperformed. My guess for his struggles is the fatigue he is experiencing due to playing an 82-game season. But tonight fatigue did not exist for him as he was active on both ends of the floor and was efficient.
• To no surprise, Victor Oladipo was great for the Pacers as he recorded 24 points and five rebounds. Especially during crunch time, Oladipo was outstanding for his team as he made a huge block on Willie Cauley-Stein and later on sunk a dagger three-pointer to seal the win for Indiana.
• The Kings did not win tonight, but they proved again that they are a clutch group of guys. Even when the game seemed over, the team just would not give up as highly-difficult shots were made by Buddy Hield and Bogdan Bogdanovic when the team needed them the most. Not a bad foundation to build on during a rebuild.

Final Thoughts

The Kings did not get the win but tonight’s game was nothing short of entertaining. Even though the Kings have not won many games this season, one can start to see the young guys gelling better with one another which has resulted in better basketball as of late.

Sacramento still has six games left until their season concludes. Hopefully, that means there will be six more games where the Kings are playing efficient and showing more signs that their youth has the ability to eventually lead this team going forth.