By: Ben Leonard
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The Kings haven’t had much to smile about in a poor campaign, but their trouncing of the Knicks on Tuesday certainly gave them a reason to grin. Sacramento humiliated New York by a final score of 124-86, even without guard Darren Collison and forward Eric Moreland.

Sacramento jumped out to an early lead, going up 35-19 after the first quarter, but took it into overdrive in the second. The Kings went on a 22-4 run that stunned the Knicks, and Sacramento never looked back. The Kings employed a team effort to emerge victorious, with six players scoring in double figures.

One of those six was star guard Rudy Gay, who scored 25 points in just 27 minutes, grabbing seven rebounds in the process. His three pointer with just over six minutes left in the contest put New York in a game-high 44 point hole, down an astounding 92-48. Without ‘Melo and confidence in their game, the Knicks were listless out on the court. They simply had no answer for the Kings, of all teams, allowingDeMarcus Cousins to score 22, and Ben McLemore to chip in with 20 points of his own. Gay, Cousins, and McLemore all sat out the fourth quarter with the game well in hand.

For all of the Knicks’ struggles, the most telling was that their starting lineup scored just 24 points. Guys like Jason Smith, Shane Larkin, and Alexey Shved all were in double figures, scoring 13, 13, and 15 points, respectively, albeit in garbage time. Sacramento moved to 21-37 with the win, and are now 3-3 under new head coach George Karl, who supplanted Tyrone Corbin. There is talk that the Kings disrespected Corbin in the hiring process, but nonetheless the move has seemed to be effective for Sacramento, which has beaten Boston and the West’s second best team, Memphis, since the swap.

 

Cover Image: By Keith Allison from Owings Mills, USA (George Karl) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons