Kings’ Brown wants to avoid ‘slippage’ down stretch
The Kings for most of the season have not been considered a great defensive team. They enter Tuesday’s road game against the Phoenix Suns ranked 23rd of the NBA’s 30 teams in defensive rating, but they have maintained their spot as the No. 3 seed in the Western Conference because their offense continues to rank among the league’s best.
But Sacramento has shown it can play capable defense in spurts. It was key during the second half and overtime in Saturday’s dramatic victory over the Dallas Mavericks, when the Kings allowed just 50 points in the third and fourth quarters while making things difficult on Luka Doncic.
Doncic missed his only shot attempt in the fourth while the Kings threw double-teams at him whether he was trying work on the perimeter or from the post. A focus coming in was forcing Doncic to turn his back to the defense with ball pressure, which proved successful. The Kings also rotated quickly to get to open shooters vacated by those double-teams. Doncic had just five assists with only one in the third quarter, none in the fourth and one in overtime.
Head coach Mike Brown has maintained throughout the season he has a roster capable of playoff-caliber defense, which Sacramento played against Dallas. But that level of intensity and focus hasn’t always been there, which proved costly in a handful of losses to lesser teams, like in December against Charlotte and Washington, and last month against Atlanta and Philadelphia, which was missing Joel Embiid and James Harden.
Much of that can be traced to a roster bereft of players with a track record of high-level defense. Brown has harped on consistency, which is a basic concept but has proven difficult to maintain on a night-tonight basis.
“It’s a tricky thing because I can’t keep demanding (consistency) the same way because guys are going to tune you out if it’s too overwhelming,” Brown said. “So you got to find different ways to let your guys know how important it is.”
Part of keeping things fresh throughout the year has involved Brown letting assistant coaches address key areas to work on to avoid things getting redundant.
Another aspect has been maintaining a regular practice schedule. Players have said this team practices more rigorously than most others in the NBA, often with practices having a college feel in terms of intensity and attention to detail. Most NBA teams, particularly those laden with veterans, treat practices more like extended shootarounds, which rarely go at full speed.
“Somebody told me this one time — especially at this point in the year — slippage is invisible,” Brown said. “Meaning that guys are a little tired, you’re a little tired, it’s easy to say, ‘You know what? Let’s just go get some shots today. Let’s just stop practice today.’ Or, ‘You know what? The guys have done a good job. We’ve got three wins in a row. Let’s go and show film today.’
“When you start doing those things, especially with a young team that doesn’t know — you might be able to do it with a veteran team at a high level — but when you’re doing it with a young team that doesn’t really know know, we start doing those things, you’re gonna get some slippage. And when you get slippage, that’s when some bad habits creep in.”
Playing poor on-ball defense and allowing ball handlers to get into the paint, slow help coming from the weak side, lackadaisical defensive rebounding, and
not closing out on shooters have all been issues at various points of the year and are some of the habits Brown was referring to.
“So we as a staff have to be aware of that and make sure we let our guys understand where we’re coming from,” Brown said. “And if they embrace it the right way, then they’ll constantly work on trying to be more consistent in their habits, not just with the defense, but offensively, their pregame work, their postgame
work and all the little things that matter to help sustain a winning culture.”
—Brown said guard Malik Monk, who suffered an ankle sprain Friday against Dallas, got shots up Monday but didn’t participate in practice. He’s uncertain to play Tuesday.
The Suns will be without newly acquired Kevin Durant (right knee, MCL sprain), backup point guard Cameron Payne (right foot sprain) and sharpshooter Landry Shamet (right foot soreness).