Seven keys to success as Kings open first round matchup against Warriors

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Game Time: 5:30PM PST

Where to watch: ABC

The city of Sacramento is buzzing. Their Kings have finally returned to the NBA playoffs after a brutal 17-year stretch.

Sacramento has gone from a fun young team playing over their heads to a Western Conference contender in just months. They have stayed healthy, stayed together and defied odds makers at every turn, winning the Pacific Division and earning a first round home playoff series as the No. 3 seed.

The Kings’ reward for finally making the postseason is a first round matchup against the reigning champs. The Golden State Warriors haven’t had the type of regular season they would like, but they rallied late and are once again a contender in the West.

Whether the Warriors have another title run in them is yet to be determined, but they are a formidable opponent with a mountain of experience.

Here are seven keys to the Kings pulling off the upset and moving into the second round.

Ride the Wave

Kings fans are shelling out cash at record rates to see their team in the first round of the NBA playoffs. The ticket prices are outlandish, but it speaks to the laws of supply and demand. Everyone in Sacramento wants to be at Golden 1 Center.

“I think it’s going to be jumping,“ De’Aaron Fox said. “I think Kings fans have been ready for this and I think the basketball world has been ready to see the Sacramento Kings back in the playoffs, so I think it’s going to be a great day.“

This should be a good thing. The Kings have drawn record crowds all season long, but for some reason, it hasn’t equated to victories. On their home court, the Kings finished just 23-18 this season, compared to a 25-16 road record.

Not only did the Kings fail to put up a strong home record, but they wilted in big moments against teams like the Timberwolves and Spurs down the stretch. For some reason, this squad looks more comfortable and locked in on the road.

They need to find a way to harness the incredible energy of their home crowd and find a way to win at least one of the first two games of this series and preferably two.

Kings fans will bring the noise. They need their team to respond.

Turn it up

Sacramento’s high-powered offense set all kinds of marks this season for greatness. They posted the highest offensive rating in league history with a mark of 118.6 and they led the league in true shooting, effective field goal percentage and two point field goal percentage.

In a surprising twist, the normally speedy Kings did all of this while posting just the 12th highest pace rate in the league. There is another gear that this team can hit and we started to see it late in the season in a win over the New Orleans Pelicans and a late season loss to the Dallas Mavericks. It was almost like Mike Brown was testing something out for the postseason.

“Our pace has to be there, we have to play with great pace,” coach Mike Brown said during media sessions this week. “Historically, you don’t really see that in the playoffs, but we cannot let our foot off the gas. We’re going to have to even turn it up, because they’re a championship level team and they’re an experienced team. If we play into their hands and/or their pace and allow them to get up into us and slow our cuts down and slow our movement and screens and half court down, we’re going to be in trouble.”

There is a difference between sprinting up and down the court and being quick and decisive within offensive sets. The Kings can turn up the volume in both of these situations as long as it doesn’t lead to careless ball handling and poor decision making.

The Kings are a relatively young team, especially when compared to the Warriors. That usually translates to getting up and down the court quicker, but it is Golden State that really pushed the tempo during the regular season, leading the NBA in pace with a rating of 102.5. This could turn into an incredible track meet and the Kings need to be ready to run.

Get Physical

There was a time when the Kings were one of the softest teams in the NBA. It was an issue last season and the season before that. This year’s version of the team doesn’t compare to the Bad Boy Pistons, but led by Domantas Sabonis in the post, this is a pretty physical team.

Brown and his coaching staff understand what the postseason is like and they have tried to prepare their team to be the aggressors and come out ready for a battle.

“Hit somebody in the mouth, that’s about it,” Malik Monk said when asked what the coaching staff has been preaching to them during the down time. “We’ve got to hit first. That’s been our main goal all year…to hit somebody first, and when we did that, we won games. If we do that, we’ll be alright.”

Physicality comes in many shapes and forms at the NBA level. For this series, the Kings need to set hard, clean screens. They need to put a body on someone when a shot goes up, because the Warriors have strong rebounders all over the court. Whether it’s fighting through big men chasing Stephen Curry around the court or getting down hill and attacking the paint, Sacramento has to win the physicality battle.

Protect Domas

Sabonis led the NBA in rebounding this season. He also led the league in personal fouls with 279. If the Kings are going to have a chance to win this series, they need their All-Star center on the court and running the offense.

Plenty of the fouls are on Sabonis for making silly mistakes, especially with hands in the back on rebounds. But there are a lot of fouls that Sabonis picks up that can be directly traced to a perimeter defender allowing their man to get free and hanging the 6-foot-11 big man out to dry.

Against the Warriors this season, Sabonis averaged 21.3 points, 16.7 rebounds and six assists. He only committed seven personal fouls in three games against Golden State, which is promising.

The Warriors will throw Kevon Looney at him for plenty of minutes and follow that up with Draymond Green for stretches. Neither is a strong offensive player, but both have a knack for getting under their opponent’s skin. Don’t be surprised if Green pulls out all the stops in this series, be it flopping or taking one of Sabonis’ big elbows to his face. He’s a world class instigator and Sabonis needs to avoid the cheap ones.

Jump on the Warriors early

The Warriors are the reigning champs and a team with an incredible amount of playoff experience. They’ve won four of the last eight titles and they are a true dynasty. They are also the sixth seed in the Western Conference playoffs and a team that scrambled late, winning eight of their last ten games to get to a 44-38 record.

Reinforcements are on their way for the Warriors in the form of Andrew Wiggins and Gary Payton II. Wiggins missed the final 25 games of the regular season dealing with an illness in his family, but is ready to return to the court and has been cleared to play 20-25 minutes in the opener.

Payton played in the Warriors’ final seven games of the season after being re-acquired at the trade deadline and then dealing with an abdominal muscle issue. He hasn’t quite looked like himself since returning, but there is potential for him to round into shape over the coming games.

In short, the Warriors have potential to get better with these two players returning and the longer they last in the 2022-23 NBA playoffs, the stronger they might get. The Kings need to strike early before Wiggins and Payton find their rhythm. These are two major pieces to the Warriors’ defense, but it can take time to integrate players back into a system and find chemistry.

Make Steph work

There isn’t some mystical secret as to why the Warriors are a dynasty. They boast the two best shooters in NBA history in Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson. Thompson has returned to form after missing two plus seasons with injury and had an exceptional year. Curry continues to pad his Hall of Fame resumé.

In order for the Kings to advance, they have to find some sort of way to slow down Steph. He is lethal from anywhere on the court and he never stops moving. His motion in the offense opens up everything for his teammates and no one player can expect to mark him for an entire game.

The 35-year-old has shown no signs of slowing. He averaged 29.4 points, 6.3 assists and 6.1 rebounds this season while shooting 49.3 percent from the field and 42.7 percent from three. De’Aaron Fox will likely be asked to step up and chase the nine-time All-Star, but it will take an army.

Expect the Kings to send Keegan Murray, Davion Mitchell, Malik Monk, Kevin Huerter, Harrison Barnes and even Kessler Edwards at Curry. He’ll still find a way to torch the Kings, like he did back on November 7 when he dropped 47 points on Sacramento.

Make him work on both ends of the court. Don’t let the Warriors hide him on defense. If he gets hot, ride it out and don’t panic. All of this is easier said than done against one of the legends of the game.

Be yourself

Despite coming into this series as heavy underdogs, the Kings were the better team this season. They lost some games late when they were resting players, but this was truly one of the best teams in the Western Conference during the regular season.

There is nothing that Brown or anyone else can do to change the discrepancy in playoff experience. The Warriors are a seasoned contender with Hall of Fame players all over the court. They have won 18 consecutive playoff series against Western Conference opponents dating back to 2014.

If the Kings show up and play with the physicality and offensive efficiency that they have brought all season, they have a shot to advance. They don’t need to get in a shootout, although that will likely happen. They just need to play to their strengths, let De’Aaron Fox push the tempo, keep their star center out of foul trouble and show no fear.

“I just want to show what I can do and what we can do on the court,“ Fox said this week following practice.

Brown, who has already won the Coach of the Year award from the NBA coaches and will win the regular Coach of the Year award voted on by the media, has done a marvelous job of keeping his team focused on the task at hand. They will take this series one game at a time and try not to get overwhelmed.

If the Kings respond the right way, we’ll have an epic series between two really fun Northern California opponents.