SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Center DeMarcus Cousins scored a game-high 36 points, and guard Ben McLemore’s acrobatic layup with under a minute left lifted the Sacramento Kings to a 107-101 victory over the Toronto Raptors at Sleep Train Arena on Sunday.
Cousins produced his third consecutive game of at least 30 points, and Sacramento held Toronto to 12 points over the final 10:23 to win for the third straight time. Cousins stopped guard DeMar DeRozan’s drive to the hoops with 20 seconds left, and Kings forward Rudy Gay hit two free throws after a foul at the other end to clinch it.
Gay added 27 points, and forward Omri Casspi contributed 14 for the Kings (4-7). Sacramento hasn’t lost since holding a team meeting after taking its sixth consecutive loss Monday against the San Antonio Spurs.
Guard Rajon Rondo, who according to Elias Sports Bureau was the first player in the team’s three-decade Sacramento history to record three triple-doubles in four games, failed in his bid to become the first to record three in a row. He finished with 14 assists to go with seven points and seven rebounds.
Only Cousins last season and Kings legend Chris Webber in 2004-05 ever recorded back-to-back triple-doubles for Sacramento before Rondo.
DeRozan finished with 24 points, and guard Kyle Lowry scored 22 for Toronto, which opened a five-game trip against Western Conference foes. Lowry had eight points during 12-1 run that made it 89-79 early in the fourth quarter, but Toronto’s offense subsequently sputtered.
The Raptors (7-4) were held off the scoreboard over the final 2:52.
Cousins has averaged 32.5 points in four games since returning from a strained right Achilles tendon, and he is proving that his long-distance shooting early in the campaign is no fluke. He canned three 3-pointers as Sacramento went into intermission ahead 53-51, and he now has 12 in the Kings’ first 11 games. He made only 11 3-pointers in his first five seasons in the league.
Toronto played its fourth game without guard Terrence Ross, who is out indefinitely with a ligament injury in his left thumb. The Kings played their fifth consecutive game without guard Darren Collision, sidelined with a strained left hamstring.
NOTES: Kings PG Rajon Rondo played an average of 46 minutes in the first four games Sacramento was without his backup, PG Darren Collison. With Collision available in the Kings’ first six games, Rondo averaged 27 minutes per contest. … F Patrick Patterson is the lone remaining player still with Toronto who was involved in the seven-player deal between the two teams that sent F Rudy Gay to Sacramento on Dec. 9, 2013. Gay, and F Quincy Acy remain with the Kings, though Acy took a one-season detour with the New York Knicks in 2014-15. … More Rondo: He needs two more triple-doubles in Sacramento’s final 72 games to tie F Chris Webber for the team’s Sacramento single-season mark of five, set in 1999-2000. … The Raptors played the first of five consecutive games on the road against Western Conference teams. Toronto was 5-10 on the road against Western Conference teams last season.