Kings build powerful bonds, experience cultural change in breakout season

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There is alway an abruptness to the end of a season. You grind and grind and then it’s over and the offseason arrives.

In Sacramento, that historically happens around the day taxes are due, but the 2022-23 season brought a few more weeks of spring. When the Kings fell to the Golden State Warriors in Game 7 Sunday afternoon, it felt like there was unfinished business for the first time. That feeling wasn’t lost on the players.

“This is probably the first time that the season ended and I’m like, upset,” De’Aaron Fox said. “Because of the way it ended and we felt like we could have kept playing, we could have got to the second round and kept our season going, this was the first time I actually felt like the season ending was kinda hard for me. You want that sting to last a little bit so you don’t want to feel that again.”

Fox vocalizing this sentiment might be taboo in certain NBA circles, but for a team that had missed the postseason 16 consecutive seasons, including five with Fox running the point, the final month or two of the year can be rough. By the time the final whistle blows on game 82, the players make a mad dash for the door and head out of town as quickly as possible.

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