Posted at 12:00 PM EST. Odds subject to change.

Pinnacle O117½ -110 BET365 O117½ -115 Sportsinteraction O117½ -115

Sacramento Team Total over 117½

Best Odds: -110 at Pinnacle

10:10 PM EST. The Kings are out to make us look like fools this season. Although we love their style of play and the many components that make them such a unified team, we bet on their win-total under (44) this season. With 19 games left and 36 wins in their pocket, that doesn't make us feel very good about our chances. Of course last season there was no Kawhi Leonard or Paul George, so the Clippers were a different program, the T-Wolves were mid, and teams like the Warriors and Pelicans weren't the threats they are this year. The West has improved, no doubt, and yet the Kings are still managing a good season. As of today they sit in the 7th spot in the West.

The key to the Kings' success is continuity. Led by the 2022-23 coach of the year, Mike Brown has assembled a talented group that fits together like peanut butter and jelly. Big-man Domantas Sabonis is as tough as his father was, the rim-protector, the clean-up guy, and an accountable producer. De'Aaron Fox (27 ppg, 8th overall) leads a roster of smaller guys that run the floor with ease, and few teams score as effectively (118 ppg, 56.3% effective field goal percentage, 57.2% two-point rate, all top 10 marks). Keegan Murphy is currently nursing a minor ankle sprain, but for the most part they've been healthy and available all season. Brown and his on-court leaders clearly do a good job, as evidenced by the incredible chemistry displayed on a nightly basis. With a newfound target on their back after finishing 3rd in the West last season, the Kings are still finding ways to win and stay relevant, and they're certainly no one's underdog (13-8, 62% ATS this season). 

More importantly for today's handicap, their team chemistry can work wonders in big contests like tonight, especially when the matchup favors their strengths. The Milwaukee Bucks are one of the elites in the NBA, there's no question about that, but outfits like the Sacramento Kings have been their kryptonite. Even in the Bucks' most recent wins post-All-Star-break (7-2), not one of those victories came against a program that plays with the style of the Kings. Of the programs that do resemble Sacramento, we've seen the Bucks have issues this season. Famously you probably remember the Indiana Pacers unseating the Bucks in the NBA's first in-season tournament, another small-ball team, and not much has changed. The Bucks continue to get overwhelmed by faster, more efficient offensive rosters. Since the start of the new calendar year, they've lost to the new-look Warriors, the Suns, the Jazz twice, and the Pacers twice again. In their first matchup against the Kings on January 14, an overtime barnburner that saw 285 points, the Bucks barely survived. They beat Sacramento by one-point, but the Kings did whatever they wanted all game (52% from the field, 42% from the perimeter).

We don't see it going any differently tonight. Sacramento is back at home after a loss two nights ago, against a Houston squad that held the home-team to just 104 points and a wretched 18% from beyond the arc. That'll regress significantly Tuesday. In their first battle, the Bucks had a defensive rating of 124.6, a mark that would make them significantly worse than the worst defensive team in basketball if they played like that every night (Washington is 30th with a 119.5 rating). Their defense has been better since the break, 7th overall, but again - they haven't beaten a program like the Kings recently. In fact, their only two recent losses (vs. LAL and GS) were against the only teams that mirror Sacramento's style of play. In 8 games against such teams in 2024, Milwaukee is allowing 143 ppg. The Kings may not win, but they'll score plenty tonight.

Farley

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