With Luke Walton’s exit, Haliburton says the team can’t rely on Alvin Gentry or the front office to turn things around alone.
Tyrese Haliburton notched his sixth career double-double in the Sacramento Kings’ victory over the LA Clippers on Wednesday, but his mind was still on his team’s rough stretch of home games.
“I feel like we got almost as many wins [in STAPLES Center] as we do at Golden 1 Center. We have to take care of home court.” Haliburton told reporters with a laugh, referring to their 2-0 record on the year in the home of both the Clippers and the Los Angeles Lakers. Sacramento has only won 3 of its 11 games played from their home arena.
Following that blunder on Tuesday night, Haliburton responded to the passionate apologies made by interim head coach Alvin Gentry and teammate Richaun Holmes, stating the fans “deserved better” from this team.
“As players, we dictated a lot of conversations [Tuesday] night.” Haliburton said. “Coach Gentry has done a good job in letting the players kind of have a lot to say – he comes in and we’re already talking…us as players knows we have to be better.
Haliburton continued that the exit of Luke Walton has felt more like a “scapegoat” than a solution to what this roster needs to fix. The Kingdom has come to a clear consensus that coaches alone are not the athletes putting the ball in the hoop, and it’s clear that inside the locker room players share that same sentiment.
“At the end of the day it’s not on [Walton] it’s on us on basketball players. It’s not on any staff, any front office – it’s not anybody except the guys on the court, we just have to be better.” Haliburton said.
‘Be better, be better, be better’ sounds like an excellent strategy to improve the record and turn this season around, but the Kings need to carve out some real action items in getting to that conclusion if this team is to be salvaged. We can strongly infer that this roster will look different in a matter of weeks, so what the players do and say in these moments can only be taken with a grain of salt.
It’s refreshing to hear the fire from players like Hali and Holmes, and hopefully more conversations are being had behind closed doors that will help this roster find a way to stay in the win column.