The Sacramento Kings beat the Golden State Warriors at their own game Sunday night, pulling away for a 122-115 win over the defending champions courtesy of splashed three-pointers and forced turnovers.
The Warriors' I-80 rivals, it bears reminding, aren't the on-court trainwreck they've been for the better part of the last two decades. Sacramento has won four straight games to get to .500, surrounding De'Aaron Fox and Domantas Sabonis with skilled three-point shooters and committing further to defense behind former Dubs assistant Mike Brown.
The new-look Kings aren't contenders, obviously, but seem bound for a play-in spot—and potentially more if Western Conference foes far above them continue struggling.
“Our guys fought and competed. I love the effort,” Steve Kerr said after the game. “We just got beat by a team that played better than us tonight.”
Golden State's early-season labors will likely subside. There were at least some signs of that progress on Sunday. The starters were outstanding once again. Andrew Wiggins was awesome on both ends. Klay Thompson drained five threes.
But the Warriors won't go back-to-back if they can't win outside Chase Center, and nearly a month into the regular season they're still searching for their first road victory.
Golden State's 0-7 start away from home is its worst since all the way back in 1989-90.
“It's always hard to win on the road. This is our third time playing them already, so that makes it even tougher to beat them again,” Kevon Looney said. “When you're on the road you can't have a lot of turnovers, give up offensive rebounds and all the small things. That's something we've been talking about as a team. We've been doing a better job of that at home, but on the road it seems to get away from us.”
Draymond Green, who called the road losing streak “insane” and “crazy,” agreed.
“You just gotta understand that your margin for error on the road in this league is way less if you wanna win games,” he said.
The Warriors squandered an early 15-point advantage and couldn't hold multiple leads in crunch-time. Sabonis had his way in the paint, feasting on Golden State's lack of size without both Draymond Green and Kevon Looney on the floor. Many of the Warriors' 18 turnovers were self-imposed. The new bench lineups were badly outplayed in both halves.
Once Sacramento committed to trapping Curry late, Golden State's offense sputtered. The Warriors missed four clean catch-and-shoot looks from three after the Kings re-took the lead with just over two minutes remaining, all created by Curry's gravity.
There will be other nights where those jumpers fall, sending Golden State to victory in the clutch. Clearly, though, this team can't rely on Curry's crunch-time heroics on a game-by-game basis. More and more teams will follow Sacramento's blueprint of literally forcing the ball from his hands.
No readily available answer is coming for the Warriors, though. Until Kerr finds a more viable rotation or a young prospect suddenly pops, losses like Sunday's shouldn't be too surprising.
Golden State, now 5-8 on the season, good for 13th in the Western Conference, just isn't a significantly superior team to Sacramento right now.
“They just outplayed us,” Kerr said. “Give them some credit.”
At least the Warriors can take solace they'll be back home at Chase Center on Monday, facing the San Antonio Spurs on the second leg of a back-to-back.
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