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CONGRATS TO THE KINGS

Cat Man

Harold Pressley. Ed Pinckney. Mark Olberding. Juwann Oldham. Mike McGee. Ralph Sampson.

A reach back to those dark days -- but fun days, c'mon, folks! -- illustrates just how far the Kings have gone tonight.

And they made an even bigger leap the other night, when a patched-up Doug Christie led the team from what could have been a sure loss to the pivotal win in this series. That night and the couple of games since, the Kings have played a step beyond what they did all season. Not just scoring a lot of points and circus passes and big dunks.

The last three games, they've been warriors, confident, business-like without losing any of the flash, dash and fun. They've won on sheer will, on dig-down-deep-do-what-it-takes-no-matter-what effort in the face of everything a damn good basketball team could dish out.

Like champions.

Critic

And now they boldly go where no Sac King has ever gone before -- to the WCF, and with HCA no less. Well deserved it is too, they dominated a decent team -- punked them in their own house twice in a row and then closed them out with basically a SIX man rotation in game 5, all six contributing major box score stats. Didn't see but a few minutes of the game, but that is one balanced set of stats in their box score.

And it will surely come down to a cage-match with the mortal-enemy-of-all-kings-fans, the Lakers! Cool. Good luck. American basketball fans will be behind the Kings. We are tired of seeing Shaq's big butt on tv every winter Sunday at 5:30pm. Make it stop! Please!

Reno Lady

Oh Boy! Hard to believe after all these years - the Kings are going back to the Conference Finals - and it feels GREAT!!!!!

The team was VERY controlled tonight, maybe more than I've seen them for a long, long time. Vlade didn't complain about a call one time and Webber really kept his cool when it was obvious the Mavs (or at least a couple of them) were trying hard to make him lose it. Memo to the Mavs: Don't tick Webber off!

This was game the Kings made up their minds to win, and they won it. A big, big growth spurt for our guys in the playoffs this year. Time to celebrate tonight - and then it's time to get after it again. Thank you Kings for what you've done this year - so far!

HoustonJP

Bibby's emergence as an offensive player will take the pressure off of Turkoglo or Peja or Bobby. Last year Fox just keyed on Peja. They can't do that this year and get away with it. The Kings are playing team ball. And, Turkoglo is just young enough to not be hyped by the Lakers. Get ready for the Phil Jackson insults, all designed to take the pressure off his players and put it on him. You locals can't let that happen, keep the pressure on the team, forget about Jackson. He is merely the beneficiary of one of the best players to play the game and now the biggest. There is not anyspecial coaching ability there. Sorry LA fans, there just isn't.

Gaijin

Knock one down and someone else pops up!

Today it was Hedo, apparently, who continued Peja's surprisingly strong D and board work. Finally got his FG% up to a respectable 47% too. He definitely looks like he should be able to hold the fort for another few games, though I'm not about to trade Peja just yet.

It really looks to me like the whole starting 5 is playing about as well as they can right now. We can nit-pick about Webber's cry-baby act etc, but on the whole, they're not doing much wrong. We have the best bench in the league. Fact. We have the most meaningful home court advantage in the league. We have motivation in buckets (how about 3 years of "Beat LA! Beat LA! Beat LA! " chants for a start?). We can run and gun with the (second-!)best. We can flop and foul and bang knees and elbows with the best. We have crazy inside/outside game, not a selfish bone on the whole team (OK, I cannot tell a lie - Bobby occasionally shows signs of velcro-hand syndrome, but apart from that...). We are well-coached (6 guys in double figures? turned the team on its head between Utah and Dallas? MAYBE he's just reacting to the environment, but if that's bad coaching, gimme one RA over Cuban's jury-full of assistants anyday). We have the best record. We beat a legit title contender in 5 games.

So why CAN'T we beat LA? WCF: Sac - 4: LA: 3!

Bonnie49erKings

I don't know what to say.

I thought I'd heard Arco get loud. But never like last night. The end of that game was amazing. My ears still hurt. And there were no cowbells anywhere near us that we could hear. It was all from people screaming.

Dan Crawford... I was SO HAPPY to see him. I'm shocked, but he and his crew (Joe Forte and Ted Bernhardt) have been the best officials we've had in the playoffs. They missed some calls both ways, but on the whole, they caught all the dirty shots. They made tough, quick decisions on offensive vs. blocking fouls and got them right. They didn't fall for a single flop. There was one call on Michael Finley that I honestly never saw. But it was in a crowd under the hoop. On the whole, when the officials are competent and unbiased, it makes all the difference. Webber had 4 fouls and he earned all of them.

Hedo plays better when he starts because he's slow to get going. When he comes off the bench in short spurts, he doesn't have a chance to get in the flow of the game unless he's in for a longer period of time. Last night, it took him until the 2nd half to warm up. He was great! He gave Dirk tough defense and many of Dirk's shots were tough ones.

But for anyone who wants Hedo to start... in place of whom?

Doug Christie is the heart of this teams energy on the floor. Sometimes I find myself just watching him regardless of who has the ball. On defense, he's just amazing to watch guarding players away from the ball, denying entry passes, filling up passing lanes. He does so much that doesn't show up in stats.

Peja? Want to start Hedo instead of Peja???

Nah, let's just be happy that we have a solid and deep team.

nypeja16

I don't think the commentators were wrong for favoring Dallas over us, and I don't think they should apologize for it. Dallas is an extremely talented team and the series could really be 3-2 Dallas right now if things had gone just a little differently. They had beaten us three times this year, twice on our own court. They had that late-season infusion of talent. They have one of the best coaches in the NBA, who regularly pulls out tricks that we seem to have no answer for. I think picking Dallas was the safe thing to do.

Even now, it's hard for me to be objective, but I think the safe thing is to predict that the Lakers win the championship. Even with all the negatives you can pile up about the way LA is playing, Kobe is so good in the fourth quarter, they can beat anyone. That being said, I support our team. I hope the Kings win and they have more than a shot. My point is just that, that's what professional sportswriters do. They look at the evidence and make a prediction, and the evidence hasn't favored us since the Utah series.

As if I hadn't said enough to invite criticism, I have one big concern about facing the Lakers. Right now, I think they're deeper than us. With our rotation reduced by injury, we have better reserves, but they have more reserves. They have four or five guys off the bench that are essentially interchangeable and all experienced. Even though they've been using an eight-man rotation, the guys are there. If the series goes long, our guys will start to get worn out, and sooner or later, we'll run into a game where all three of our key reserves struggle. That being said, if we win the first two, they might as well start fitting us for rings. The Lakers would not be able to handle a 2-0 deficit, mentally. Once we erased their swagger advantage, our overall talent advantage would be too much for them.

My prediction: if we win games 1 and 2, Kings over Lakers in five. If we split the first two, Kings over Lakers in seven.