Game 2: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

Evans held his own against the league's best point guard

Game two is now in the books and there is a much better feeling surrounding the Kings after battling the New Orleans Hornets to the finish in a 97-92 loss. There were lots of positive moments, so let’s start with those.

Tyreke Evans: I was a little worried about this match-up coming in.  I expected the league’s best point guard to baptize, posterize, and vaporize the rookie, but that just didn’t happen. Evans more than held his own and was clearly the most impressive Kings player on the floor. He finished the evening with 22 points, three rebounds, two assists, and two steals on 7-for-13 shooting  from the field. He also hit 7-of-8 from the line. He finished with three turnovers, but that is more than acceptable versus Chris Paul. Paul, the league’s top thief, failed to record a single steal against Evans. Paul appeared to be noticeably frustrated and did not score a lot in the first half, but imposed his will down the stretch, something that superstars do, and Tyreke could learn from that.  This is going to be a match-up that will be very fun to watch for the next decade.

Andres Nocioni: Nocioni did exactly what he is supposed to do and that is provide firepower off of the bench. He scored 16 points on 5-of-8 shooting including three treys in just over 24 minutes of action. His scoring seemed to come exactly when the Kings needed it and he helped stabilize the offense when it looked like they had gone stagnant and the Hornets were about to go on a run.

Rebounding and Turnovers: These are two key areas where the Kings much improve and they looked much better last night. The Kings were losing the rebounding battle early on, but when Jon Brockman came in, that all changed. He was everywhere and grabbed 10 boards in only 19 minutes of play. The Kings were able to outrebounded the Hornets 52-43 after losing that battle 42-36 in the previous game. They finished the evening with only 10 turnovers and that is definitely a number that we can live with from the third youngest team in the NBA.

Effort: The effort was much improves this evening and the Kings played much better than game one. They won the rebounding battle and the turnover battle and seemed to answer every run by the Hornets. This is a young team that will need to learn how to win games like this in the future. If they continue to play hard like they did in this game and compete, they will win more games than people expect.

The Bad:

Spencer Hawes: Okay, now I am officially worried about Hawes. He appears timid and looks lost out there. The third year is when players are supposed to take a step forward, not a step back. I wasn’t all that worried about Sean May taking significant time from Hawes and still expected him to get his 30 minutes a game, but if he is expected to be the muscle and hussle off of the bench, then he is failing and the bigger threat to his playing time will be Jon Brockman. Being aggressive doesn’t mean chucking up a shot every time he touches the ball. He seems very intent on that, even though it is Nocioni’s role off of the bench. Hawes needs to take a page from Brockman and go in there and start scrapping. Get rebounds and put backs and block shots. If he doesn’t start doing that, he won’t play nearly as much or be much of a factor this season as was expected.

Layups: The Kings blew so many layups last night that it was embarrassing. Jason Thompson and Kevin Martin combined to miss several. Thompson finished the evening shooting 4-of-16 from the floor with only nine points. Omeka Okafor was definitely a factor as he blocked four shots on the night and was very active on the defensive end, but don’t let the boxscore fool you as there were several easy layups that should have been converted. Tyreke Evans probably should have had eight or nine assists on the evening if not more if he teammates had converted many of their layups.

The Ugly:

Kevin Martin’s Shooting and Shot Selection: Kevin Martin had his second consecutive poor shooting nigh as he finished 9-for-29 from the field. It was easily a new career high in attempts for Martin as his previous career high for attempts was 24, established on three different occasions. He also tallied 37, 45, and 29 points in those games. Martin was just off tonight. That happens. It was a game that the Kings should have won and a normal night from Martin gets the job done, but there is something more disturbing here and that is Martin’s shot selection. He jacked up anything and everything that came to him and didn’t work within the offense, despite other players on the team having a much better rhythm in Andres Nocioni and Tyreke Evans.  Martin used to be one of the most efficient scorers in the NBA that took shoots as they came to him and operated off of the work of others with guys like Mike Bibby or Ron Artest acting as the primary offensive options and finding Martin for open looks. Last season, that changed as both players were no longer around and more was expected from Martin. He started forcing shots because he had to and the Kings needed his offense. Well, what was good last season for the team, may be it’s undoing this year. Martin developed some bad habits last year on his way to shooting the lowest percentage of his career. He must go back to what made him a special player and that is his efficiency. He can still score 25 within the framework of the offense and only take 15 shots instead of 25. If the Kings are going to get better, it will be based on efficiency and ball movement. Something they completely abandoned when Rick Adelman left. Hopefully Paul Westphal brings those concepts back and Martin becomes the player he was and not a guy that chucks it up on a regular basis. Lots of bad habits will need to be undone from the last few years.