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A close look at the Sacramento Kings 2010-2011 schedule

2010-08-17T23:15:41Z

For the past five seasons the Sacramento Kings have opened up the regular season on the road facing teams that were above .500 the previous year. This year they will again start on a three-game road-trip in late October, but won’t be playing the likes of Dallas, Houston or Orlando.

Instead, the Kings will travel to Minnesota, New Jersey and Cleveland – two of those teams are young, and the other team is in a downward spiral looking to stay afloat in the east after the departure of its superstar.

Besides their games against the defending champion Los Angeles Lakers and a game at Phoenix, the Kings have a pretty soft schedule to start the year.

With only one back-to-back game in November, the Kings will have enough time to become familiar with the new guys and mold as a unit.

Three games in November will be broadcast on national television.

The Lakers game on Nov. 3 will be on ESPN, the game on Nov. 21 will be shown on NBATV and the game against the Clippers on the 25th will be on TNT.

The Kings will start off December at the Staples Center taking on the Lakers and, the following night, playing Dallas.

After a game against the revamped Miami Heat, the Kings will go on a three-game road trip to Houston, New Orleans and Oklahoma City.

The ensuing five games will be at home, where they will take on teams that had a combined 44 percent win percentage.

The 2010 half of the season will be the easiest part of the 82-game schedule. If the Kings can stay healthy and out of trouble, they should be able to win about 12 or 13 games for that portion of the season.

At first glance, you might think sarcastically, oh great 12 wins, who do I call for season tickets? But if you compare that amount of wins to last year’s seven wins in the first 30 games, the improvement is obvious.

Just because their schedule may be a bit modest the first couple months doesn’t mean winning will come easy. They will still have to play well together and work hard on both ends of the floor.

Because you play the same teams the same amount of times each year, an easier schedule early on means the second half of the schedule will be even tougher.

Not only are 10 of the 16 games in January on the road, six pairings of games will be on back-to-back nights.

February won’t show them a lot of love either, with only two of their games being played against teams that didn’t make the playoffs last season.

The last two months of the regular season will be a bit kinder to the Kings.

In March, the Kings will play four straight at home, four on the road, then again four straight in ARCO Arena.

These were months that in recent years had Kings fans looking at the draft lottery, but this year they should hope for something different.

With a young team like the Kings have – the oldest players having eight and six years of experience – young guys like Tyreke Evans, Carl Landry and Jason Thompson will have to improve on their games while new guys like DeMarcus Cousins, Samuel Dalembert, and Hassan Whiteside will have to prove people wrong.

I don’t expect the Kings to make the playoffs, and neither should you, but a season in which there is no noticeable improvement based on their record and actual play would be a failure.

The Sacramento Kings won 25 games last year, and based on the improvements to their size and post-defense, along with another year of the core group of guys being together, the over/under for wins this year will be set at 34 wins.

Playoffs would be the ideal place for the Kings to be, but when you’re in a conference that had all eight of its playoff teams win 50 or more games, you have to realize your time for the playoffs will come, just not as soon as you’d like.

Pictures taken by Brendan Luna and myself.

Tyreke Tuesdays: Evans has big weekend ahead

2010-02-09T02:55:58Z

Despite the fact that the Sacramento Kings (16-34) are slumping, its rookie guard, Tyreke Evans, has a bright weekend ahead of him during the 2010 NBA All-Star Weekend in Dallas, Texas.

Evans, along with fellow rookie teammate Omri Casspi, will represent the Kings on the Rookies team in the T-Mobile Rookie Challenge & Youth Jam at the American Airlines Arena, home of the Dallas Mavericks.

The Rookie Challenge is a game where the league's best first-year players (Rookies) of this season compete against the best of the second-year players (Sophomores), who have won the past seven games.

The game will be televised on TNT Friday at 6 p.m.

Evans will also compete in the Haier Shooting Stars contest alongside former King Chris Webber and former Sacramento Monarchs forward Nicole Powell.They will form the first Team Sacramento.

Shooting Stars is a competition where teammates shoot from six spots on the court in order of numbers one through six. The team that finishes with the fastest time wins.

The contest will also be televised on TNT Saturday at 5 p.m., when Team Sacramento faces teams Atlanta, Los Angeles and Texas.

Evans and Casspi will be the first to represent the Kings in the Rookie Challenge since Hedo Turkoglu played as a rookie in 2002. They will also be the first Kings to participate in an All-Star event since Brad Miller and Peja Stojakovic in 2004.

Although Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry won January's T-Mobile Western Conference Rookie of the Month, Evans won the October/November and December award and is the top candidate for Rookie of the Year.

Through three games this month, Evans has averaged 18.7 points, 5.3 rebounds, seven assists and 1.7 steals per game. For the season, he's averaging 20.3 points, 4.6 rebounds, 5.1 assists, 1.5 steals and 0.5 blocks per game.

This weekend, Evans will make his second and third national television appearance. He impressed many in his first nationally televised game with his superb performance and game-deciding steal against the Washington Wizards on Dec. 16.

Now, Evans has another opportunity to put the Kings back on the map in front of a much larger audience.

Juveniles now wanted felons after fireworks theft

2009-07-03T21:51:22Z

Three juveniles, ages 14 to 15, cased then robbed the fireworks stand on the corner of 47th Ave & 44th St. in South Sacramento Friday just after noon.

A Sheriff helicopter orbited the area around the school where the juveniles were last seen breaking apart the large package of fireworks they had just stolen from the fireworks stand hosted by Parkway Swim and Tennis. Public address announcements were made from the helicopter stating to people in the neighborhood: "we are looking for three felons who just stole a large red package of fireworks…" This was the largest package of fireworks offered and is considered a "block party" set that sells for $600. The helicopter spotted the torn apart red packaging in the middle of the school field where ground officers retrieved it.

Kids present from Parkway Swim and Tennis turned and saw the juvenile thieves fleeing with the large package that took all three of them to carry away. They alerted volunteer mom Jessica Rodriguez-Veneroni who ran after the subjects.

The three juvenile wanted felons remain at large. If you live in the area and have information that may lead to the apprehension of the suspects and return of the items, please contact the Sacramento Sheriffs department right away.