While the 2024-25 NBA regular season still has plenty of time until completion, one of the more disappointing teams have been the Sacramento Kings. While they couldn’t get through the Play-In Tournament last season, they still finished with a 46-36 record. In 2022-23, they went 48-34. It was the first time they had a winning record in back-to-back seasons since 2004-05 and 2005-06.
During the offseason, Sacramento acquired six-time All-Star DeMar DeRozan, a move that seemingly would upgrade their team. Instead through 30 games, the Kings are now 13-17, and have lost four in a row. All four of those defeats have come at the Golden 1 Center, Sacramento’s home arena.
The Kings Are Failing To Light The Beam Far Too Often
Kings Have Now Lost Four Home Games In A Row
’Light the Beam’ has become a popular phrase for the Kings and their fans starting in the 2022-23 season. The team began to light a purple beam after each home win. The term became a rallying cry by the fans as that season, Sacramento ended a 16-year drought without reaching the playoffs.
Unfortunately for the Kings, more often than not their home games this season have ended with no purple beam being lit. With their four straight losses all at home, Sacramento is now just 6-11 on their home court. With their 13-17 record, they are 12th in the Western Conference, 2.5 games out of a Play-In Tournament spot.
The home woes continued on Sunday night, as the Kings fell at home to the Indiana Pacers by the score of 122-95. The game was tied at halftime before Indiana outscored the Kings by nine in the third quarter and 18 in the fourth. The Pacers shot 58.1% in what turned out to be an easy victory for them, compared to the Kings making just 36.5% of their field goal tries.
Kings star center Domantas Sabonis gave a simple, but powerful response when talking about their home woes,
“It sucks we’re dropping a lot of games at home. You have to take care of home court.”
Domantas Sabonis on the frustrations of today’s 122-95 loss to the Pacers, feeling as low as they have as a team this season after dropping a 4th straight game, falling again on their home floor and find their confidence again. pic.twitter.com/B59rwOMyUE
— Sean Cunningham (@SeanCunningham) December 23, 2024
Sacramento will try to avoid an 0-5 home stand on Thursday when they take on the Detroit Pistons.
Kings Have Failed To Exert Home Court Dominance Over Recent Seasons
While seeing the Kings light the beam has been a fun way to end wins for their fans, it hides the fact that Sacramento hasn’t necessarily enjoyed much of a home court advantage. They have had similar records on the road in recent seasons.
In the 2022-23 season when the lighting of the beam began, they went 23-18 at home compared to 25-16 on the road. Last season, they went 24-17 at the Golden 1 Center and 22-19 in away outings. So since the 2022-23 season, Sacramento has a slightly better record on the road (54-41) than at home (53-46) since 2022-23.
What makes the Kings season even more disappointing as a whole is that they have stayed relatively healthy, especially compared to other teams. Star point guard De’Aaron Fox has yet to miss a game, and Sabonis has only missed two. Keegan Murray has missed just one, and DeRozan has missed five.
In a stacked Western Conference, the Kings need to get it together quickly and light the beam more often, before they fall out of playoff contention.
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