Three days after authoring the highest-scoring game of his NBA career, a 43-point barrage at Utah, Anthony Davis was an unlikely candidate to attempt only 12 shots vs. Sacramento on Tuesday, but that was the power forward’s allotment in a home defeat to the Kings. New Orleans fifth-year head coach Monty Williams attributed the drop-off to New Orleans (7-6) not sufficiently finding the 21-year-old All-Star in the team’s offensive attack. It also didn’t help that Davis appeared to be less than 100 percent physically, one of a few Pelicans players who may have picked up minor colds during last week’s four-game road trip.
Still, Sacramento (9-5) posted an excellent early-season road win Tuesday despite having a few alibis of its own, namely that starters Rudy Gay and Darren Collison were late scratches due to injury. In their place, fill-in first-stringers Omri Casspi and Ramon Sessions turned in outstanding performances, tallying 22 and 15 points, respectively.
New Orleans lost for the first time at home since Nov. 1, getting outplayed by Sacramento in the second half of a Western Conference matchup between clubs hoping to reach the playoffs. The Kings broke up what had been a 49-all deadlock at halftime, outscoring the Pelicans by a 50-40 margin in the latter half. The visitors led by as many as 15 points.
“We took a couple bad shots, turned the ball over,” Davis said of the momentum change. “They were playing in the paint the whole game, got a lot of layups and dunks. And they got to the free-throw line.”
Sacramento (20-for-24 foul shooting, 44 paint points) avenged a home loss to New Orleans exactly one week earlier, a game in which the Pelicans were the better team in the second half.
“They just played with a lot of energy,” Davis said of the Kings. “Knowing that we just beat them, they were going to come out with a lot of energy, try to outpower us on the boards, play in the paint. That’s what they did tonight.”
Among other statistics, Davis is one of the NBA’s leaders in dunks this season, but he only had one slam Tuesday vs. Sacramento. The league’s No. 2 scorer equaled his lowest output of 2014-15, with his fewest points since Nov. 3 at Memphis.
Asked if he was playing at 100 percent health Tuesday, Davis responded, “Yeah. Just because I’m a little sick doesn’t mean I can afford to play like that. I’ve got to do a lot better. We have to do a lot better as a team… I wasn’t getting a lot of easy looks that usually get us going, running the floor, getting to the free-throw line. I wasn’t doing it tonight. It was kind of tough. They just outworked us. We didn’t get easy catches or take easy shots. It’s tough to play like that.”
“I know that he’s going to give as much as he can,” said Ryan Anderson, who dropped in 20 points off the bench. “Whatever he has in the tank, he’s going to give it. Even on a night when we know he’s sick, he gave a ton of effort and battled. It happens – teams get sick and a couple guys are feeling under the weather. We’ve got to get healthy, get in the gym and practice.”
Williams was critical of his team’s decision-making, particularly in the second half, when Davis took just five shots.
“We’ve got to make a concerted effort to get him the ball when he needs it,” Williams said. “We just had some guys take awful shots. That’s the bottom line. Some of our guys don’t understand that they’re playing with other people. They will understand it tomorrow (at Wednesday’s practice).”
In slipping to 4-2 in the Smoothie King Center this season, New Orleans also had to contend with a shuffle of its lineup, replacing Eric Gordon (shoulder) by sliding Tyreke Evans (team-best 22 points) to shooting guard and moving Darius Miller (0-for-3 shooting) into the first unit at small forward. On the positive side, Omer Asik (3 points, 7 rebounds) returned to the lineup and started at center. Another issue: Point guard Jrue Holiday picked up his fourth personal foul early in the third quarter. That was when the Kings took the lead and kept it the rest of Tuesday’s game.
“It probably affected us some,” Williams said of Holiday’s forced temporary exit due to foul trouble, “but the guys who come in have to perform and we just didn’t do it tonight. We scored 40 points in the second half. We didn’t execute any kind of offense tonight. You’ve got to get guys out there who give you a chance. We just didn’t play well tonight. It wasn’t the lineups.”