Kings-Spurs Preview

By PAUL DIGIACOMO
Posted Jan 19 2012 6:48PM

After allowing their most points in over a year earlier this week, the San Antonio Spurs shut down their last opponent. They may be able to have a similar result against the next team they face.

San Antonio looks to extend its winning streak over the poor-shooting Sacramento Kings to 13 on Friday night when it begins a stretch of four games in six days.

The Southwest Division-leading Spurs (10-5) had their three-game winning streak snapped with a 120-98 loss at Miami on Tuesday night. It was their most points given up since falling 128-115 at New York on Jan. 4, 2011.

San Antonio bounced back the next night, holding Orlando to its second-lowest point total of the season in an 85-83 overtime win. Tony Parker scored 25 points - 16 in the fourth quarter and overtime - to help give the Spurs their first road victory in six tries.

"We wanted to come here and try to play well and have an opportunity to win the game," said Parker, who's averaging 18.5 points and 7.5 assists in 10 games since Manu Ginobili was lost to a broken hand. "I'm happy it bounced our way finally."

The Spurs held the Magic to 33.3 percent shooting, a season low for an opponent.

"It took every minute of that game and we couldn't make shots at the right time, but we continued to make stops, continued to push," forward Tim Duncan said.

San Antonio now gets to face a Kings team it has dominated over the past few seasons, and Sacramento is coming off another poor shooting performance, although it was during a win.

The Kings (5-10) made 30.1 percent of their field-goal attempts Wednesday night in beating Indiana 92-88, rallying from 14 points down in the fourth quarter.

Sacramento made more free throws (12) in the final period than the Pacers scored points (eight).

"I don't know how we did it, but this group has some resilience," coach Keith Smart told the NBA's official website. "They fought, they found a lineup that worked, they got us back in the game and then they closed it out."

Wednesday's effort came two games after the Kings shot a season-low 25.6 percent in a 99-60 loss at Dallas on Saturday.

"It was good for us to get this win even though we shot such a bad percentage," said Francisco Garcia, who came off the bench to score a season-best 16 points - half on free throws. "But we're not going to keep shooting like that."

Sacramento is shooting an NBA-worst 38.9 percent and is near the bottom of the league with 90.3 points per game.

The Kings are shooting 37.5 percent and averaging 84.5 points in going 1-7 on the road, and they'll be facing a Spurs squad that is the last team in the Western Conference without a home loss.

San Antonio has held opponents to 42.8 percent shooting and an average of 90.3 points in winning all nine games on its own floor.

The Spurs have outscored the Kings by an average of 13.8 points and held them to 43.6 percent shooting in winning nine straight at home in the series, taking 28 of the last 34 meetings overall.

Evans, Kings stun Spurs 88-86 in final minute

By PAUL J. WEBER
Posted Jan 21 2012 1:50AM

SAN ANTONIO (AP) In an already tumultuous season for the Sacramento Kings, road trips have been especially brutal.

They finally caught a break away from home, in perhaps the most unlikely place.

Tyreke Evans had 23 points and 11 rebounds, including a 22-foot jumper with 47.2 seconds left to put the Kings ahead for good in a surprising 88-86 victory over the San Antonio Spurs on Friday night.

The Spurs had been 9-0 at home, best in the NBA. Sacramento, meanwhile, had been abysmal away from home, getting blown out by an average of 23 points in its seven road losses.

"It just shows you the type of team we've got. We've got all the pieces to this puzzle," Evans said. "We've got big men, we've got guards. We just have to play hard for all 48 minutes. It shows the type of team we can be."

DeMarcus Cousins had 17 points and 13 rebounds and Marcus Thornton also scored 17 in Sacramento's second road victory of the season. The Kings are still trying to sort themselves out after coach Paul Westphal was fired this month following his escalating feud with Cousins, and Sacramento seemed to savor this win as if it was needed.

Evans paced around the court with both his arms raised. His teammates lingered long on the floor with wide smiles and high-fives as the stunned Spurs walked to their locker room.

Tony Parker led the Spurs with 24 points. San Antonio led 84-78 with 4 minutes to go but missed its last five shots, including Danny Green badly airballing a short runner as time expired.

Green said the play was the same one as a spectacular give-and-go with Tim Duncan that worked in Orlando two nights earlier. But this time Green, a former deep reserve who's been thrust into a significant role because Manu Ginobili broke his hand, took the shot himself instead of tossing it back to the perennial All-Star.

"I had Timmy for a drop-off but I wasn't sure if I had enough time left," said Green, who finished with eight points. "I let it go, and it was a little short."

It was the end of a disappointing final minute for Green, who was standing in front of Evans as the Kings star pulled up for the winning shot.

San Antonio started 9-0 at home for the third time in franchise history. Now only Chicago (6-0) remains unbeaten at home.

The Spurs hardly gave the game away. Sacramento led the entire way before Spurs center Tiago Splitter finally put San Antonio ahead with just under 10 minutes left.

Splitter, Duncan and DeJuan Blair all had 10 points for the Spurs. Duncan, coming off a punishing back-to-back in Florida, didn't play in the fourth quarter save for the final 5.5 seconds.

Jason Thompson added 10 points and 10 rebounds for the Kings. Evans had seven assists.

The Kings nearly let this upset slip away. They built a surprising 15-point lead early in the second quarter that quickly evaporated thanks to seven consecutive missed shots and bad decisions. Among them was Cousins getting a technical foul for protesting his third personal - despite teammate J.J. Hickson racing toward referee Ed Malloy in hopes of talking him out of a whistle.

He didn't make it in time.

"I gave him a chance," Malloy told Kings coach Keith Smart.

A chance is rarely what the Kings have had on the road. The NBA's youngest team was routed by 39 points in Dallas last week.

Four of Sacramento's next five games are on the road, too. It's one of the myriad challenges facing Smart, who took over Jan. 5 after Sacramento fired Westphal. The Kings are 4-5 since.

"We can make plays, as long as we keep our composure, play together, play for each other," Cousins said. "The thing about this team is we're very talented, we have all the pieces. We have to keep growing each game."

Notes: Sacramento C/F Chuck Hayes missed his eighth straight game with a dislocated left shoulder, but Smart said his big man is finally able to sleep through the night without pain. Smart said he expects Hayes to resume contact in practice in the next few days. ... The Spurs hadn't lost to the Kings at home since 2006.

Notebook: Kings 88, Spurs 86

By Tim Price, for NBA.com
Posted Saturday January 21, 2012 12:31AM

THE FACTS: Tyreke Evans hit 10-of-19 shots and scored 23 points in 43 minutes (he added 11 rebounds and seven assists) and the Sacramento Kings won consecutive games for the first time this season in an 88-86 victory over the San Antonio Spurs on Friday at AT&T Center.

The Spurs (10-6) had won four of their last five, and it was their first home loss of the season in 10 tries. The Kings (6-10) had DeMarcus Cousins (17 points, 13 rebounds) and Jason Thompson (10 points, 10 rebounds) join Evans with double-doubles.

Danny Green missed a final shot for the Spurs when he drove around Tim Duncan in the final five seconds and tried one in the lane from inside five feet. The play was similar to one that worked Wednesday night in Orlando when Green drove and dumped back to Duncan for an easy layup late in the game.

QUOTABLE: "We just kept pushing the ball. Once we pushed the ball and played like that, we can beat anybody. It shows what type of team we have. We have all the pieces to the puzzle. We just have to go out there and play hard for 48 minutes, and this shows what type of team we can be."
-- Evans

THE STAT: Sacramento scored only 15 points in the fourth quarter, but the Kings made five of their last six shots from the floor compared to the Spurs missing their final five shots.

TURNING POINT: The Kings had a 15-point lead early in the second quarter and blew a nine-point lead late in the third quarter. They looked to have lost all momentum when they trailed 84-78 with 3:51 to go. But their comeback was ignited by John Salmons. Though he had hit 1-of-5 up to that point in the game, he hit a pair of jumpers over Richard Jefferson to tie the game with 1:23 remaining. The next trip down the floor Evans hit a pull-up jumper from 22 feet to give the Kings enough to win.

QUOTABLE II: "They just never went away the whole game, and we couldn't hit a shot."
-- Tony Parker, who led the Spurs with 24 points but complained about the team shooting 37.8 percent on the night.

HOT: Cousins' 17-point, 13-rebound night (he was 7-of-12) came in 15 less minutes of playing time than his teammate Evans. Cousins, called for three fouls in the first half plus a technical that showed his frustration, also had four offensive rebounds and four steals.

NOT: The beat goes on for Kings first-round pick Jimmer Fredette. He hit his first shot of the night, a three, and missed his next three shots. He's 2-of-12 overall in the past two games and 2-of-11 from the 3-point line in the past five games.

FANTASY SPOTLIGHT: Evans' 23-point, 11-rebound and seven-assist night broke him out of nasty slump. He was 10-of-19 against the Spurs, but he came into the game hitting 7 of his last 33 from the floor and a total of only 20 points in his last three games.

GOOD MOVE: With the game out there on the table and wide open, the Kings stuck with their best creator on offense. Evans played all of the fourth quarter and all but six seconds of the third when he hit all three shots from the floor and had five rebounds.

BAD MOVE: Duncan came out of the game with a little less than three minutes left in the third quarter for Tiago Splitter and did not return until the final play of the game and Green's miss. But Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, seeing a trip to Houston for the second game of a back-to-back Saturday, said "the group that was out there (without Duncan on the floor) was blitzing a doing a great job. They got us back in the game and and got us a six-point lead at one point."

ROOKIE WATCH: Kawhi Leonard had a string of five-straight games with double-figure scoring, but he's gone the past two games with six points total. The Spurs' other rookie, Cory Joseph, had a missed shot and turnover in almost six minutes of play and was moved over to off-guard on some occasions to allow Gary Neal to run the backup point. Kings rookie Isaiah Thomas took four shots -- all threes -- and missed all of them.

NOTABLE: This is the first time the Kings have won in San Antonio since April 2006, breaking a nine-game losing streak at AT&T Center. Also, the Spurs had won 12 in a row overall in this series. ... In their first of consecutive victories the Kings rallied from 14 points down to beat Indiana. They limited the Pacers to eight fourth-quarter points and tonight kept the Spurs to 19 in the final quarter, San Antonio's worst output of the game.

UP NEXT: For the Kings, Saturday @ Memphis, Monday @ Portland, Wednesday vs. Denver. For the Spurs, Saturday @ Houston, Monday @ New Orleans, Wednesday vs. Atlanta.

• Kings: Honeycutt, Whiteside
• Spurs: Ford, Ginobili

• Kings: Cousins
• Spurs: --

• Lead Changes: 4
• Times Tied: 2

• Arena: AT&T Center, San Antonio, TX
• Officials: #47 Bennie Adams, #14 Ed Malloy, #45 Brian Forte
• Attendance: 18581
• Duration: 2:10