With another controversy involving the Sacramento Kings, the distractions were thrown out the window and they stepped up to the challenge without their floor general in last night’s 107-97 victory.

Rajon Rondo sat out after being suspended by the league for making homophobic slurs to official Bill Kennedy but thankfully for the Kings, Darren Collison was very Rondo-esque and nearly finished with a triple-double.

“We all know what kind of player Rondo is, but when someone is down, we still got to be able to win games,” Rudy Gay said after the game. “You’ve got to be able to pick each other up and today, Darren came out there and he made an effort to keep this team in check and run the team like a point guard should.”

Now let’s dive into my 3 takeaways:

Collison is more than capable

For starters, I made the bold prediction that the Kings would beat the Rockets without Rondo because the Rockets are a team that struggles defending quicker offensive guards and Collison’s high-paced game would generate more problems for the Rockets because if they gave him room to shoot, he would take that all day. Rondo is a pass-first point guard and struggled with his shot in the first meeting.

In Rondo’s first matchup, he finished with 12 points and -18 in the plus/minus category. Collison led the team with 22 points and nine assists. In Rondo’s second matchup, his overall performance was excellent as he finished with 13 points and 19 assists. Collison chipped in 18 points. My point is Collison was more than capable filling in for one game and playing at a high level. He surpassed expectations as he finished with 14 points, 13 dimes and seven rebounds. +17 in the plus/minus department. That will get it done on most nights.

Harden’s big night wasn’t enough

We knew coming into the game that James Harden has tortured the Kings on many occasions. The Kings had to decide if they were going to allow Harden to have a huge scoring night, which he did or allow him to get his teammates involved, and make the game easier for them. The Kings defended well and Harden’s team struggled. Patrick Beverley was the only starter to have a solid game but that wasn’t enough. The Kings were content with Harden’s 33 points but really happy with the 21 forced turnovers and four points and four rebounds from Dwight Howard.

“Whatever it was, we need to play harder and figure it out,” Harden said. “That’s the type of messages that are sent. Our defense will get there, but we have to make it get there. We’re showing spurts on defense but we are not consistent.”

Frustration from your opponent’s best player on most nights will earn you a victory because the Rockets will go as far as Harden takes them. And right now, he’s not playing at the MVP level we saw last season and his team is not responding to controversy the way a championship contending team would.

The Kings shook off 28 turnovers

The Kings had 28 turnovers and won the game. I am not kidding. But like George Karl says, every game has its own personality. And this game was a unique one to say the least.

“I’m not sure I’ve ever won a game by 10 points where my team committed this many turnovers,” Karl said. “I’ve got a crazy team and I’m kind of crazy. Some of our crazy decisions were amazing.”

Many of the turnovers came when the Rockets went with their super small lineup. The Kings were trying to feed Cousins in the post but when the double team came, the Kings struggled and they became sloppy.

With that said, the Kings had an answer for every run the Rockets would make and they closed out the game on a memorable moment. I’ll let the video do the talking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lYgvCimxDU

The Kings are now on a three game winning streak and will head on the road with a lot of confidence. The team is finally healthy and we shall see if they can end 2015 on a positive note.