by Charlie O. Mallonee

The Phoenix Suns (17-14) brought their “run and gun” basketball show to Sacramento on Friday night and went home with their fifth consecutive win beating the Kings 115-106.

The Suns are known for wanting to take the 3-point shot whenever possible. Against the Kings, they attempted 33 3-point shots and connected on 14 (42.4 percent). Everytime the Kings would make the score close, the Suns would hit a big 3-point basket and kill the Sacramento momentum.

Sacramento came into the game with a huge disadvantage because DeMarcus Cousins (Gastroenteritis), Ramon Sessions (low back strain) and Ryan Hollins (personal) were all unavailable to face Phoenix. The Kings knew they would need every player on the bench to step up and give their all to have any chance against a very talented and hot Suns team.

Phoenix had a four point lead (94-90) heading into the fourth quarter. Former King Isaiah Thomas became a “one man wrecking crew” leading the Suns with nine points in the final 12 minutes. The Suns built their largest lead of the night (15 points) with 5:12 to go in the game and then played ball control offense to use as much clock as possible to preserve the victory.

The Kings even tried using a three guard lineup in an attempt to close the gap on the Suns late in the fourth period. Darren Collison, Ben McLemore and Ray McCallum worked to get open in hopes of taking 3-point shots but were prevented from getting open looks from beyond the arc.

Phoenix shot 48.9 percent from the field (46-94) while shooting 42.4 percent (14-33) from 3-point land. The Suns went nine for 12 (75.0 percent) from the free throw line. Phoenix recorded 25 assists and 46 rebounds.

Marcus Morris led the Suns scoring with 20 points coming off the bench for Phoenix. Eric Bledsoe scored 18 points while Markieff Morris added 17. Goran Dragic scored 16 while Alex Len recorded a double-double with 10 points and 11 rebounds to go with five blocked shots. Isaiah Thomas recorded 17 points coming off the bench against his former team.

The Kings were 41 for 93 (44.1 percent) from the field and were seven for 20 (35.0 percent) on 3-point attempts. Sacramento was 17 for 24 from the charity stripe. They had 48 rebounds and 18 assists.

Darren Collison was the Kings leading scorer with 19 points. Collison was four for seven on 3-point attempts and had two assists to go with three steals. Rudy Gay scored 16 to go with his five assists. Reggie Evans recorded a double-double (11 points, 16 rebounds) in his fill-in start for Cousins.

Derrick Williams scored 16 points off the bench including 11 in the first half to go with his perfect five for five field goal shooting. Ben McLemore (13), Carl Landry (12) and Omri Casspi (11) were all in double figures for Sacramento.

Speaking about Williams performance head coach Tyrone Corbin said, “I thought the energy he played with in the first half was good. He came in the second half, they made a run and the matchups didn’t match up as well for us in the second half. But he did a great job for us in the first half, had 16 (total) points.”

In analyzing the loss Corbin said, “Well you give up 25 fastbreak points, 19 second chance points. They made some shots; took 33 3-pointers and shot 42 percent from the 3-point line. Those were things we talked about before the game.started, keeping them out of our paint. The had too many opportunities to get in our paint, collapse out defense, and get open shots on the perimeter.”

The Kings have no time to relax and recover from the loss as they have to play the back-end of the home back-to-back games versus the New York Knicks on Saturday night.

Game notes: The Kings are now 12-17 overall and 7-10 at home … Sacramento and Phoenix have split the first two games of the series 1-1 … the Kings have scored 100 or more points in each of their last four games … the Kings have allowed their opponents to score 100 points or more in each of their last five games … Darren Collison has scored in double figures in each of his last four game.