Let's face facts people, the Sacramento Kings (without Kevin Martin or Mike Bibby) could play the Boston Celtics 100 times this season and they might lose 99 of them.
Without those two guys, Boston just has way too much talent for the Kings. This was illustrated by last night's ugly 89-69 win by the Celtics in Sacramento. The C's only had to play two good quarters (the second quarter was exceptional) to beat the Kings by 20.
The win was Boston's first in over 11 years in Sac-town and also a great way to kick off its four games in five nights West Coast trip.
Both teams struggled to find the basket in the first quarter as the Celts held a tight 18-16 lead after one. In the second quarter, the theme of crazy runs began. Boston had an 11-0 spurt to start the quarter and eventually found themselves in the midst of a 33-5 run before halftime. As a reward, Boston (23-3) carried its largest lead of the season-24-into the half (53-29).
Roles reversed in the third quarter as the Kings kept scoring and Boston couldn't buy a bucket. The Kings (11-16) valiantly cut it to five early in the fourth but it takes way too much energy to come back from a hole that big. NBA announcers like to say ad nauseum that in the NBA everybody makes a run but you have to admit it's true. Of course it also helps when you're up as much as Boston was, therefore you can play like garbage for a quarter and change and still roll.
Ray Allen led the way for Boston with 17 points, three steals and three rebounds. Paul Pierce added 16 points, six assists and four rebounds while Kevin Garnett (14 points, 10 boards), Rajon Rondo (13 points, 4 boards, 4 steals, 3 assists) and James Posey (11 points, 6 rebounds) all played well at times. Eddie House notched nine points off the bench.
Three-pointers were one of the main reasons for the big margin of victory since the Celtics hit 11 of 22 while the Kings mustered 2 of 15. The Celts only shot 40.8% overall but they held the Kings to their lowest point total of the season, as they were 38.2%. The Celts continued to exhibit many staples of winning teams-outrebounding Sacramento 45-36- and sharing the basketball-19 assists.
Ron Artest was the high-scorer for the Kings with 15 points while John Salmons (13) and Francisco Garcia (12) were the only other players in double figures. Brad Miller had seven points and 11 rebounds as he's quickly fallen off the NBA map.
Tonight Ray Allen returns to Seattle as the Celtics take on the Sonics, in a 10:30 game on TNT. It should be an emotional night for Sugar Ray as he returns to the team where he became a star, albeit in anonymity. It'll be strange to see Wally and Delonte West in Seattle uniforms since they were big parts of the disaster that was the Celtics the last few seasons.
The Sonics are extremely young and they give up 105 points a game so look for the Celtics to put up a three digit number and coast to a win.
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