WASHINGTON, DC - FEBRUARY 01: Will Riley #27 of the Washington Wizards drives to the basket against Devin Carter #22 of the Sacramento Kings during the second half at Capital One Arena on February 1, 2026 in Washington, DC. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Scott Taetsch/Getty Images) | Getty Images
The Wizards swarmed defensively in the first half and built a 17-point lead, slacked off enough to give back the entire advantage, and then let the
deep bench mob play the entire fourth quarter to escape with a 116-112 victory.
If you’re worried about The Tank, yeah — be worried. It was Washington’s 13th win of the season, which puts them in a tie with the Brooklyn Nets for fourth worst winning percentage. The Utah Jazz — with their propensity for thoroughly unethical tanking shenanigans — lurk at sixth worst, scant percentage points behind.
Ashamed owners of the league’s worst winning percentage? The Sacramento Kings.
The Kings thought they’d be good. Or hoped they would be. Or something. They’re the Kings, which means they could turn a fairly promising roster with an interesting future into
this in just two off-seasons. Their roster-building strategy appears to have been finding guys who have less impact on winning than you’d think based on their reputation and glory stats (points, rebounds, assists). Their big three: DeMar DeRozan, Zach LaVine, and Domantas Sabonis. Check, check, check.
Plus, Sabonis was out. Again.
All three are good-to-very-good players, by the way. None of them have quite the impact you’d want or expect.
The Kings broadcast kept mentioning the trade they’d made, which shipped out some guys and brought back a guy. The deal: Dennis Schroder, Keon Ellis, Dario Saric, and a second round pick for De’Andre Hunter. I’m not sure they missed anyone they traded last night, except perhaps in spirit. It’s doubtful Hunter would have helped much. It’s a classic, “
Hey, how ‘bout that.“ kind of move — give up not much to get not much. It doesn’t make them better, younger, or cheaper, and they actually gave up a draft pick to do it. #SoKings.
There was a game, and I was entertained. As mentioned in the lede, the Wizards were all over the Kings defensively in the early going. They kept deflecting passes and poking at the ball and forcing Sacramento to reset their offense. The Kings were working hard to generate difficult shots, and it showed — they shot 4-22 in the first quarter and committed six turnovers.
And then, the Wizards did the kind of thing 19-21 year olds are prone to do: they slacked off a bit. The attention to detail waned, the maniacal effort drooped, and the Kings started getting easier shots and wider paths to the basket. This is normal developmental stuff, and head coach Brian Keefe responded by rewarding the play-hard deep bench mob with all of the fourth quarter minutes.
Thoughts & Observations
- My habit of watching the opposing team’s broadcast may have backfired on me. Not because the Kings broadcast is bad — Kayte Christensen is a strong analyst, and Kyle Draper is decent on play-by-play — but because they never addressed why Justin Champagnie didn’t play. In their defense, I did a quick google this morning and didn’t find a definitive answer.
- My first quarter notes are filled with words like “deflection” and “pressure.” Those words stop appearing midway through the second quarter.
- At 6:32 of the first quarter, Bilal Coulibaly had what I jotted down as a “sleight of hand” steal. It was so quick and casual, I missed it live — DeRozan was dribbling and suddenly the ball was loose. I rewound and on replay, I could see Coulibaly’s superb ball targeting and defensive disruptiveness.
- When Sacramento’s Nique Clifford converted a layup with 9:15 remaining in the second quarter, it was the Kings’ first field goal in more than 10 minutes of game time.
- This is the version of Coulibaly the Wizards want. He defended well, attacked on offense, and set up teammates. He’s so quick and long that he should be able to generate paint touches nearly any time he wants. Big things for him to work on: tighten up the ball handling, trust his athleticism when trying to finish (in other words: go over people, accept the contact, and get to the free throw line), and work on that three-point shooting.
- Want an example of Keefe’s play design prowess? Check the video at 7:15 of the third quarter. The team ran a high staggered pick-and-roll for Middleton with screens from Kyhawn George and Marvin Bagley III. Coulibaly was positioned in the weakside corner; Carrington out top on the wing. The staggered screen forces the weakside defender (LaVine) assigned to Carrington to come over to help on Middleton. Just as Middleton comes off the screens and LaVine has to commit, Coulibaly cuts baseline. The Coulibaly cut has to be covered by the low man (Maxime Raynaud). Meanwhile Carrington drifts to the corner — each step lengthening LaVine’s eventual closeout. Middleton makes the pass, and Carrington suddenly has the ball with literally not a single Sacramento defender on his side of the floor. He nails the wide open three.
- Late in the third quarter, Jamir Watkins got yet another open court strip. This time, his victim was LaVine. It’s not as flashy as Grand Theft Alvarado, but it’s effective.
- Devin Carter was a YODA favorite despite being small — strong production and eye-popping athleticism. That athleticism was on display on a spectacular dunk at 9:09 of the fourth quarter.
- 9:09 — Devin Carter SPECTACULAR dunk in transition — 95-95
- DeRozan wanted to attack Anthony Gill and kept forcing switches to get him. It was mostly successful by DeRozan’s standards — he got the relatively difficult midrange jumpers he wanted, and mostly made them. That said, I thought Gill did his job properly. He kept DeRozan away from the paint and contested the low value shots the Wizards would have wanted him to take.
- One cool thing: Throughout the fourth quarter, the team’s starters cheered for the bench mob like a collective Anthony Gill.
- Amusing moment: Late in the game, Sacramento’s broadcasters were calling for the Kings to foul Washington. Meanwhile, Kings coach Doug Christie was hollering at his players NOT to foul. When they finally did, he was thoroughly disgusted. In that situation — down three with 23 seconds to go in the game and 16 seconds on the shot clock — the Kings didn’t need to foul.
- Sacramento is now on a nine-game losing streak.
- The Wizards have won three of their last four.
- It was fun to see Will Riley leading the team’s offense for an extended stretch. He finished with 18 points, 6 rebounds, 6 assists. His offensive rating (points produced per possession x 100) was a lofty 131 (average so far this season is 115.4).
- Sharife Cooper — generously listed at 6-0 — was the game’s leading rebounder. He had seven boards in 13 minutes of action, including a tip-in with 37 seconds remaining to put Washington up 115-110.
- Bagley punished the Kings (who drafted him, never figured out how to use him, and then traded him for next to nothing) with 15 points (on 7-8 shooting) and 6 rebounds in 19 minutes.
Four Factors
Below are the four factors that decide wins and losses in basketball — shooting (efg), rebounding (offensive rebounds), ball handling (turnovers), fouling (free throws made).
The four factors are measured by:
- eFG% (effective field goal percentage, which accounts for the three-point shot)
- OREB% (offensive rebound percentage)
- TOV% (turnover percentage — turnovers divided by possessions)
- FTM/FGA (free throws made divided by field goal attempts)
| FOUR FACTORS | KINGS | WIZARDS | LGAVG |
|---|
| eFG% | 51.2% | 59.7% | 54.3% |
| OREB% | 31.0% | 35.1% | 26.1% |
| TOV% | 14.5% | 17.6% | 12.8% |
| FTM/FGA | 0.310 | 0.125 | 0.209 |
| PACE | 97 | 99.5 | |
| ORTG | 116 | 120 | 115.4 |
Stats & Metrics
PPA is my overall production metric, which credits players for things they do that help a team win (scoring, rebounding, playmaking, defending) and dings them for things that hurt (missed shots, turnovers, bad defense, fouls).
PPA is a per possession metric designed for larger data sets. In small sample sizes, the numbers can get weird. In PPA, 100 is average, higher is better and replacement level is 45. For a single game, replacement level isn’t much use, and I reiterate the caution about small samples sometimes producing weird results.
POSS is the number of possessions each player was on the floor in this game.
ORTG = offensive rating, which is points produced per individual possessions x 100. League average so far this season is 115.5. Points produced is not the same as points scored. It includes the value of assists and offensive rebounds, as well as sharing credit when receiving an assist.
USG = offensive usage rate. Average is 20%.
ORTG and USG are versions of stats created by former Wizards assistant coach Dean Oliver and modified by me. ORTG is an efficiency measure that accounts for the value of shooting, offensive rebounds, assists and turnovers. USG includes shooting from the floor and free throw line, offensive rebounds, assists and turnovers.
+PTS = “Plus Points” is a measure of the points gained or lost by each player based on their efficiency in this game compared to league average efficiency on the same number of possessions. A player with an offensive rating (points produced per possession x 100) of 100 who uses 20 possessions would produce 20 points. If the league average efficiency is 114, the league — on average — would produced 22.8 points in the same 20 possessions. So, the player in this hypothetical would have a +PTS score of -2.8.
Players are sorted by total production in the game.
| WIZARDS | MIN | POSS | ORTG | USG | +PTS | PPA | +/- |
|---|
| Marvin Bagley III | 19 | 38 | 201 | 17.9% | 5.8 | 311 | -10 |
| Will Riley | 30 | 61 | 131 | 24.4% | 2.4 | 176 | 8 |
| Skal Labissiere | 27 | 53 | 157 | 14.4% | 3.2 | 190 | 6 |
| Bilal Coulibaly | 21 | 43 | 139 | 23.9% | 2.4 | 162 | -2 |
| Khris Middleton | 18 | 36 | 127 | 25.9% | 1.0 | 153 | -4 |
| Jamir Watkins | 16 | 32 | 117 | 19.8% | 0.1 | 133 | 2 |
| Sharife Cooper | 13 | 26 | 119 | 22.7% | 0.2 | 158 | 4 |
| Bub Carrington | 23 | 46 | 109 | 16.3% | -0.5 | 50 | -1 |
| AJ Johnson | 27 | 55 | 87 | 33.2% | -5.1 | 7 | 8 |
| Kyshawn George | 19 | 38 | 84 | 17.7% | -2.1 | 1 | -2 |
| Anthony Gill | 27 | 55 | 18 | 6.2% | -3.3 | -23 | 11 |
| KINGS | MIN | POSS | ORTG | USG | +PTS | PPA | +/- |
|---|
| Zach LaVine | 35 | 71 | 121 | 33.4% | 1.3 | 179 | -8 |
| DeMar DeRozan | 33 | 65 | 141 | 32.5% | 5.5 | 183 | -14 |
| Maxime Raynaud | 27 | 55 | 126 | 19.0% | 1.1 | 114 | -1 |
| Nique Clifford | 29 | 58 | 144 | 11.1% | 1.9 | 105 | -5 |
| Isaiah Stevens | 19 | 38 | 150 | 10.1% | 1.3 | 142 | -3 |
| Devin Carter | 16 | 32 | 97 | 17.4% | -1.0 | 96 | 2 |
| Doug McDermott | 6 | 11 | 307 | 6.5% | 1.4 | 205 | 10 |
| Drew Eubanks | 4 | 8 | 214 | 12.3% | 1.0 | 261 | -5 |
| Dylan Cardwell | 20 | 41 | 129 | 8.9% | 0.5 | 49 | 0 |
| Precious Achiuwa | 9 | 19 | 81 | 37.0% | -2.4 | 43 | -11 |
| Daeqwon Plowden | 24 | 49 | 25 | 5.0% | -2.2 | -16 | 5 |
| Malik Monk | 17 | 35 | 39 | 31.0% | -8.3 | -133 | 10 |
COULIBALYYYYYYY!!!!! 
