{"id":545254,"date":"2026-01-18T19:44:21","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T19:44:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/545254\/"},"modified":"2026-01-18T19:44:21","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T19:44:21","slug":"kings-vs-trail-blazers-going-streaking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/545254\/","title":{"rendered":"Kings vs. Trail Blazers: Going Streaking"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Kings have won 4-straight games for the first time this season, defeating the Rockets, Lakers, Knicks, and Wizards. They\u2019ve won each of these games by 10+ points, and face the Portland Trail Blazers tonight to see if they can extend the streak to 5. Let\u2019s get into it.<\/p>\n

Who: Sacramento Kings (12-30) vs. Portland Trail Blazers (21-22)
Where: Golden 1 Center, Sacramento, CA
When: 6:00 PM PT \/ 9:00 PM ET
Watch: NBCSCA \/ League\u00a0 Pass<\/p>\n

The Kings are playing some good basketball right now, and that includes the returning Domantas Sabonis. The Kings center hadn\u2019t played since mid-November, and returned to the lineup on Friday against the Wizards. In 20 minutes off the bench, Sabonis dropped 13 points, 6 rebounds, and 5 assists on 5\/6 shooting from the field, and looked pretty comfortable out there.<\/p>\n

Great sign for Domas, bad sign for the tank.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

At the moment, the Kings are playing about as well as anyone could reasonably expect. If fans want to enjoy it that, go ahead. I\u2019m not going to tell you what to celebrate, but I am going to share the other side of the coin. The problem is that the ceiling for this team, both heading into the year, and right now on January 18, is making the play-in game. They have played well below that ceiling for most of the year, hence the unintentional tank ride we\u2019ve been on for most of the season, but they always had this potential. They\u2019re getting healthier. They\u2019re getting more comfortable with each other. But we\u2019re still looking at a play-in ceiling.<\/p>\n

And that is a dangerous ceiling, particularly when your team is as old and veteran-reliant as the Kings are.<\/p>\n

Thankfully Brooklyn also won their game on Friday night, so the Kings still hold the 4th worst record in the league, but Sacramento also has one of the easiest remaining schedules in the NBA. They\u2019ve got to be careful. With 10 games remaining before the trade deadline, the vets can still do some damage to the tank before some of them are shipped out, if that\u2019s the plan. That\u2019ll require Scott Perry to turn what has been an accidental tank thus far into a very intentional tank and youth movement.<\/p>\n

It\u2019ll also require ownership to be on board, and these recent victories could quickly turn Vivek Ranadive into a believer. That\u2019s where the organization can really get themselves into trouble.<\/p>\n

Go Kings, but don\u2019t go\u00a0too well.<\/p>\n

Prediction: Kings 117, Blazers 108.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Kings have won 4-straight games for the first time this season, defeating the Rockets, Lakers, Knicks, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":545255,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3792],"tags":[7,4056,6,986,477,4055],"class_list":{"0":"post-545254","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sacramento-kings","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-kings","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sacramento","12":"tag-sacramento-kings","13":"tag-sacramentokings"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115917820784428198","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/545254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=545254"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/545254\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/545255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=545254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=545254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=545254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}