Kings at Pelicans
The New Orleans Pelicans began life without DeMarcus Cousins on a down note after squandering a 21-point lead in a 112-103 loss at the Los Angeles Clippers on Sunday. The Pelicans will try to put two halves together and continue to improve without their All-Star center when they host the Sacramento Kings on Tuesday.
Cousins went down with a season-ending Achilles injury last week, and his absence on Sunday was most notable in the way it allowed the defense to key on fellow big man Anthony Davis. "We don't have DeMarcus out there, so (Davis) has two or three guys on him and all he's doing is making the right basketball play," New Orleans coach Alvin Gentry told reporters. "He shouldn't force the ball up there and take bad shots. He ended up with six assists. They're not going to allow him to go one-on-one, because they know what kind of player that he is. When they run another player after him, he's got to be willing to make the right play." Which set of players guards Davis on Tuesday will be a question for the Kings, who are trying to rest veterans and give more time to younger players. That plan took a hit on Sunday, when young big men Skal Labissiere (shoulder) and Willie Cauley-Stein (knee) both sat out and veterans Zach Randolph, 36, and Kosta Koufos, 28, got the starts in the frontcourt in a 113-98 loss at San Antonio.
TV: 8 p.m. ET, NBCS California (Sacramento), FS New Orleans
ABOUT THE KINGS (15-34): Adding his name to a lengthy Sacramento injury list on Sunday was head coach Dave Joerger, who left the game in the first quarter and headed to the locker room after feeling lightheaded. "You never like to see anybody hurt or not feeling good," point guard George Hill told the Sacramento Bee. "We just wanted to know that he was fine. We came back here and he addressed us at halftime and was calm and said he's going to get healthy and get back with us." The positive coming out of Sunday's loss came from rookie point guard De'Aaron Fox, who scored a season-high 26 points while going 6-of-6 from 3-point range.
ABOUT THE PELICANS (27-22): New Orleans will look to guard Jrue Holiday to pick up some of the offensive slack in Cousins' absence, and he collected 20 points, nine rebounds and seven assists in Sunday's setback. "I need to just continue to play my game," Holiday told reporters. "I trust my teammates to pick up the slack. I have to stay consistent and rebound a lot more. A lot of the slack will be taken from Darius (Miller), Dante (Cunningham), and DeAndre (Liggins). I feel (Davis) and I played defense as we always have, staying intense on the ball and make it difficult for people to shoot threes or at the basket." Holiday is averaging career highs in scoring (18.7 points), shooting percentage (.496) and rebounds (4.5).
BUZZER BEATERS
1. Kings SG Garrett Temple (ankle) sat out Sunday and is day-to-day.
2. Pelicans PG Rajon Rondo scored in single digits in each of the last nine games.
3. Sacramento earned a 116-109 overtime victory at New Orleans on Dec. 8.