Birthday boy De’Aaron Fox has huge first half for Kings, but Boston Celtics spoil party
Kings point guard De’Aaron Fox looked like he was going to throw a big birthday bash in the early stages of Wednesday’s game, but the Boston Celtics spoiled the party.
Jaylen Brown and Derrick White scored 28 points apiece to lead the Celtics to a 144-119 victory before a sellout crowd of 17,874 at Golden 1 Center.
Kristaps Porzingis had 24 points and nine rebounds for the Celtics (21-6), who were on the second night of a back-to-back after suffering a 132-126 overtime loss to the Golden State Warriors on Tuesday. Jrue Holiday scored 21 points and Payton Pritchard added 20.
Fox scored 29 points to lead the Kings (16-10), but he was held to three points on 0-of-3 shooting in the second half.
Kings coach Mike Brown was asked what the Celtics did to limit Fox’s effectiveness as the game went on.
“They were just physical,” Brown said. “They got back in transition. They loaded the paint. They were very physical. At the start of the game, it was a track meet and nobody was really playing defense, and then you could see they cranked it up. I started complaining to the officials. We all started complaining to the officials, and they smelled blood and they cranked it up even higher. That probably had something to do with it.”
Domantas Sabonis posted his 22nd double-double of the season with 13 points, 10 rebounds and eight assists. Keegan Murray also scored 13 points.
The Celtics welcomed the 7-foot-2 Porzingis back to the lineup, but they were missing MVP candidate Jayson Tatum (ankle) and center Al Horford (rest). Tatum was ruled out after spraining his left ankle in Tuesday’s game against the Warriors.
During his pregame news conference, Brown said he wanted his club to push the pace against a Boston team that was playing its fifth game in seven nights.
“For sure,” Brown said. “That’s who we want to be. That’s part of our identity, and, regardless if they’re coming off a back-to-back, we want to play fast, but we definitely want to do it with them coming off a back-to-back and an overtime game.”
Despite the emphasis on playing with an up-tempo pace, the Celtics finished with a 30-6 advantage in fastbreak points while shooting 55.4% from the field and 52.4% from 3-point range.
“They had a lot of fastbreak points,” Kings guard Keon Ellis said. “That kind of helped them get into some of those 3s and those easy field goals, so that definitely killed us in that aspect of the game.
“… As much as he talked about pushing the pace, I still think even though they’re playing a back-to-back or whatever the case is, they’re still going to push the pace as well, so it’s still on us to get back on defense and defend our rim and not give them easy baskets.”
Brown was disappointed with the disparity in fastbreak points.
“We didn’t do a good job of getting back,” Brown said. “They just played harder than us. They were more physical than us. They were up in us, and starting with me, I’ve got to do a better job because you try to complain to the officials, but they’re human. They’re going to make mistakes and it ain’t going to change, and the more you complain, they’re human, so the more they’re going to try to call things against you, and so we’ve got to be grownups about it.
“I’ve got to leave the officials alone because when I start whining, everybody seems like they start whining and it’s a snowball effect. If we’re going to be the team that’s supposed to be the physical group out there, then when we face physicality, we’ve got to figure out a way to play through it and let’s try to play our game and not let it impact us on either end of the floor.”
The Kings followed the gameplan and came out firing in the opening minutes. Fox went 3 of 3 from 3-point range to start the game, scoring 11 points in the first five minutes to help Sacramento race out to a 23-11 lead.
The Celtics stormed back with a 13-0 run to take a 24-23 lead on a 3-pointer by White, but the Kings led 41-38 at the end of the first quarter. Fox went 5 of 6 from 3-point range in the opening period, finishing the first quarter with 17 points, three assists and three steals. Fox established a new career high for 3-point goals in a quarter. He also became just the third player since 1996-97 to record 15 points, five 3-point goals and three steals in the first quarter, joining Chris Mullin and Vernon Maxwell.
Fox finished the first half with 26 points on 9-of-14 shooting from the field and 6-of-8 shooting from beyond the arc, but the Kings trailed 74-66 after getting outscored 36-25 in the second quarter. The Celtics outshot the Kings 55.1% to 46.3% while going 14 of 24 (.583) from 3-point range.
Boston went up by 21 points early in the second half. At that point, the Kings were getting outrebounded 34-18. Brown briefly turned to a jumbo lineup of Fox, Murray, Harrison Barnes, Trey Lyles and Sabonis, but that didn’t work either.
The Celtics went up by 28 when Jaylen Brown threw down a monster dunk over Lyles to put Boston up 106-78 late in the third quarter. The Kings trailed by as many as 30 in the fourth.
The Kings have dropped five in a row to the Celtics dating back to the 2021-22 season, losing by an average of 29.6 points per game.
Monk cleared to play
Kings guard Malik Monk was questionable for Wednesday’s game due to right foot irritation. He was cleared to play about 30 minutes before tipoff.
Monk, a Sixth Man of the Year candidate who came in averaging 14.8 points and 5.2 assists, had a rough night. He went 0 of 6 from the field and 0 of 4 from 3-point range before making his first basket at the 5:37 mark in the third quarter. Monk finished with 10 points on 3-of-10 shooting.
Up next
The Kings will play host to the Phoenix Suns on Friday on the first night of a back-to-back before concluding a six-game homestand against the Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday.
The Suns (14-13) are coming off a 109-104 loss to the Portland Trail Blazers despite a 40-point game from Kevin Durant. The Suns are 10th in the Western Conference. They suffered a 114-106 loss to the Kings on Dec. 8 in Phoenix.
Upcoming schedule
Dec. 22 vs. Phoenix Suns
Dec. 23 vs. Minnesota Timberwolves
Dec. 26 at Portland Trail Blazers
Dec. 29 at Atlanta Hawks
Dec. 31 at Memphis Grizzlies
This story was originally published December 20, 2023 at 9:24 PM.
