Kings vs. Trail Blazers Preview – By the Numbers
Another night of games and another night of waiting. The Kings will look to clinch tonight on the road, and should have a much easier path than on Monday as they face the tanking Blazers. At this point, the Kings aren’t just trying to clinch a Playoff spot, but they are close to clinching a top-4 position and home-court advantage as well. Let’s see what they can do to secure their position in the postseason tournament.
On the season, the Trail Blazers have the 10th ranked offense, 27th ranked defense, and 25th best Net Rating. What makes looking at them by the numbers difficult is that this is not the same team. Damian Lillard, Jerami Grant, Jusuf Nurkic, Anfernee Simons, and Justice Winslow are all out tonight, and even Cam Reddish is doubtful. On Monday, the Blazers started Shaedon Sharpe, Matisse Thybulle, Ryan Arcidiacono, Nassir Little, and Drew Eubanks, and none of them scored more than 12 Points.
Sharpe has shown some nice flashes this season, and is averaging a solid 14.4 Points, 4.2 Rebounds, and 1.6 Assists on 45.5/38.5/76.5% shooting splits in his 9 games as a starter this year. He has the athleticism to jump through the roof, but my main question will be can he play solid defense tonight against the Kings. My gut answer is no, and the numbers from the previous 2 games back it up. The Kings have shot 9-of-13 (69.2%) on FG’s that Sharpe has defended and 6-of-8 (75%) on 3’s he’s covered. I would go at him over and over, making him fight through screens and movement to look for open shots.
On the other side of the coin, there’s Thybulle, who you can almost choose to stay away from if you’d like. A perk of having the best offense in the league with so many different scoring options is that one individual defender can’t slow you down. If Thybulle is on Fox, the Kings can go to Sabonis and Huerter DHO action. If he’s on Huerter, you can go to Fox. So on, so on. Another note for Thybulle is that he’s shooting 38.2% from beyond the arc in his 19 games as a Blazer, well over his career average of 33.3%.
In what has seemed like a never ending storyline this season, Mike Brown is once again searching for his best option at backup Center. In the last 4 games, Metu has played 17:51 minutes, Holmes has played 8:37, and Len 7:29. There’s something that Metu is doing out there that Brown doesn’t like, but he’s clearly been the best option all season long. He actually has the highest On/Off Net Rating on the entire team at +5.7. He has his ups and downs but fits in the dunker spot perfectly and adds to the Kings potent offense more when he’s out there than the Holmes and Len.
It also seems like a matter of time before Lyles takes over as the small-ball center. According to Basketball Reference, he’s only played 6% of his minutes at center this season, but has the size and skill to hold down the position for stretches of time. The Blazers are very thin at backup center, so it may not be a big question for tonight’s game, but will be a big one with the playoffs and shorter rotations potentially looming.
This game feels like one where if the Kings just hit there shots at a decent clip they should win. They are coming off of their worst 3-point shooting night of the season and are due for some shots to fall. Even if the 3 doesn’t fall tonight, they should be able to score at the rim or line enough to put this one away. Let’s light the beam tonight and finally clinch that playoff spot!
