The Sacramento Kings have fired coach Mike Brown lower than midway by means of his third season with the workforce mired in a five-game dropping streak.
General supervisor Monte McNair referred to as the transfer a “troublesome determination” and thanked Brown for his work. Assistant Doug Christie will take over as interim coach, along with his first recreation coming Saturday night time on the Los Angeles Lakers. Christie has been an assistant with the Kings since 2021-22 and performed in Sacramento for 5 of his 15 NBA seasons.
Sources instructed ESPN’s Shams Charania that the Kings knowledgeable Brown of the firing on a telephone name whereas Brown was driving to the workforce airplane for a flight to Los Angeles, the place Sacramento performs the Lakers on Saturday. The Kings made the choice to half with Brown mid-afternoon and determined to name him earlier than he entered the airplane, sources added.
Brown’s firing comes because the Kings are mired of their longest dropping streak since January 2022 — with all 5 loses coming at dwelling. Sacramento is 13-18, getting into Friday, three video games again of incomes a berth in a play-in recreation.
The Kings have misplaced an NBA-worst 9 video games this season after main within the fourth quarter with essentially the most woeful one coming in Brown’s ultimate recreation as coach Thursday night time towards the Detroit Pistons.
Sacramento led by 10 factors with lower than three minutes to play solely to break down down the stretch. Jaden Ivey transformed a four-point play with 3 seconds left when he made a 3-pointer in the proper nook and was fouled by De’Aaron Fox. That gave the Pistons a 114-113 win, leaving the Kings in twelfth place within the Western Conference.
The Kings got here into the season with hopes of ending within the prime six within the West and avoiding the play-in event after buying DeMar DeRozan in a sign-and-trade deal over the summer season so as to add to a core that featured Fox, Domantas Sabonis and Keegan Murray.
Fox, who’s within the second-to-last yr of his five-year, $163 million contract, declined to signal an extension within the offseason. He mentioned on a podcast with Draymond Green earlier this month that he needed to be on a workforce that would “compete at a excessive stage.”
Sacramento has been removed from that this season, thanks largely to an NBA-worst 3-11 report in video games determined by 5 factors or fewer. Brown publicly criticized Fox for his position within the game-winning play Thursday night time, saying he ought to have been nearer to Ivey as a substitute of committing a foul on a detailed out.
“You must be hugged as much as your man on the 3-point line,” Brown mentioned. “Everybody ought to, and why there was a closeout by Fox, I’m unsure. I obtained to return and watch the tape. But for certain one hundred pc we instructed our guys, cannot hand over a 3, cannot hand over a 3, cannot hand over a 3, keep on the excessive aspect, keep on the excessive aspect.”
Brown gained Coach of the Year in his first season in Sacramento in 2022-23, main the Kings to a No. 1 seed earlier than dropping in seven video games to the Golden State Warriors within the first spherical of the playoffs. The Kings look snapped a 16-season drought and not using a playoff berth, the longest streak in NBA historical past.
Brown has a 107-88 report in two-plus seasons in Sacramento with a profitable report in each of his full seasons. Rick Adelman is the one different coach to submit a profitable report in a full season because the Kings moved to Sacramento
Brown beforehand had two stints as coach in Cleveland and spent one-plus season as Lakers coach. He has a 455-304 report and has made the playoffs in seven of his 9 full seasons. He gained Coach of the Year twice, additionally getting the award in Cleveland in 2008-09.
Brown had signed a three-year extension by means of 2027 with the Kings in June.
Information from The Associated Press was used on this report.
