Blazers Roll Past Short-Handed Kings 110-98 as Sacramento Falls to 0-4 in the Preseason

By The Sports Desk, Previously

October 14, 2026

Portland never trailed and led by as many as 35 at Golden 1 Center, where Sacramento rested eight rotation players and shot 33 percent. Deni Avdija led all scorers with 26.

There are preseason losses, and then there are preseason losses that read like a roster announcement. Sacramento's 110-98 defeat to Portland at Golden 1 Center on Tuesday night was the second kind. The Trail Blazers never trailed, led by as many as 35 points, and won their third straight preseason game, according to Sactown Sports, against a Kings team that had ruled out most of its rotation shortly before tipoff and spent the evening shooting 33 percent from the field. The final margin flatters Sacramento, and everyone in the building knew it.

The Game Was Decided by Who Didn't Play

Start with the inactive list, because it is the story. Sactown Sports reported that the Kings entered the night without Zach LaVine, Domantas Sabonis, Malik Monk, Dylan Cardwell, Maxime Raynaud, Ben Simmons, Darius Acuff Jr. and De'Andre Hunter — eight players, including the franchise's two stars and its sixth man. The decision, Sactown Sports reported, appeared geared toward getting the roster healthy for the regular-season opener against the Los Angeles Clippers next Wednesday, October 21, after a training camp of two-a-day practices.

Portland treated the night oppositely. The Blazers played their regulars into the second half, and Sports Illustrated's takeaways from the game described the matchup as looking like a Summer League squad against an NBA team. The quarter scores tell the same story without any adjectives: Portland won the first quarter 33-22 and the second 33-17, taking a 66-39 lead into half-time. Sacramento actually won the fourth quarter 32-17, long after the game had stopped being a contest, which is how a 35-point hole becomes a 12-point final.

Avdija Leads, Murray Works His Way Back

Deni Avdija led all scorers with 26 points, according to the game's box score. For Portland, the night doubled as another data point in the backcourt conversation that has followed the team all month: Scoot Henderson started alongside Damian Lillard, handed out four assists and looked comfortable contributing without controlling every possession — the kind of performance that, as Heavy reported, is giving coach Micah Nori a genuine rotation question in a crowded guard room, with Henderson's rookie contract nearing its end and his strong preseason, including a good shooting display against the London Lions earlier in the schedule, shifting the discussion about his role.

Sacramento's one available projected starter was Keegan Murray, making his second preseason appearance after an ankle injury during training camp. Murray played 19 minutes — up from eight in his first appearance on Saturday against Golden State — and finished with 10 points on 4-of-11 shooting, Sactown Sports reported. In a game with few usable evaluations for the Kings, Murray's minutes ramp was the closest thing to a planned takeaway.

Christie's Delicate Balance

Head coach Doug Christie did not pretend the situation was ideal. Speaking after the game, he acknowledged that time may be running out for the Kings to build chemistry in the preseason, while maintaining that health, soreness and workload have to be managed at the same time — a balance he described, in Sactown Sports' account of his comments, as delicate. The tension is real and it is not really Christie's invention: Sacramento is now one week from the start of the regular season and, as Sactown Sports noted, has yet to see its fully healthy roster on the floor together at any point this preseason.

That is the actual risk embedded in an 0-4 record that, by itself, means nothing. Preseason standings are trivia. But rotations are learned behaviour — who closes, who switches, whose help rotation is late — and the Kings have spent October learning them in theory. The Clippers will not grade on a curve on October 21. Christie has one more week of practices, and possibly one more preseason look, to get his real team its first real minutes together before the games start counting.

Where It Fits in a Busy Night

Tuesday was one of the fullest nights of the young NBA preseason calendar, and Sacramento's no-show was not even the evening's loudest result — our full NBA wrap of the October 13 slate covers Kawhi Leonard's Toronto return and the rest of the scoreboard, and Golden State's rally past the Lakers in Las Vegas is recapped in our Warriors-Lakers report. Portland, meanwhile, keeps doing the quiet work: three straight preseason wins, a settled veteran core, and a young guard playing his way into a bigger role. One team's October is about discovery. The other's, increasingly, is about a deadline.

Portland's October Is Pointing the Other Way

Put the two benches side by side and Tuesday was a study in opposite Octobers. Portland, as Sports Illustrated noted in its takeaways, played its regulars into the second half — a deliberate choice with the regular season a week away, treating a road preseason game as a final rehearsal rather than a rest stop. The Blazers have now won three consecutive preseason games, their veterans have logged real shared minutes, and their one open question is a pleasant one: how large a role Scoot Henderson has earned alongside Damian Lillard after a preseason in which, as Heavy reported, he has repeatedly fit in without dominating the ball.

Sacramento's remaining runway is short and specific. The Kings have one week before the Los Angeles Clippers arrive for the October 21 opener, and the work is not conditioning or scheme — Christie has had all camp for that — but the five-man familiarity that only shared game minutes build. Murray's ramp from eight minutes to nineteen is the template the whole roster now has to follow at once, compressed into days. If the Kings open the season looking like a team meeting itself for the first time, Tuesday night in an emptying Golden 1 Center will be where that started. If they open sharp, it will be because the rest-first gamble Christie described bought health without costing readiness. The preseason record, 0-4, will be forgotten either way. The choice behind it will not be.