Sacramento Kings survives Orlando Magic's final push behind De'Aaron Fox's 31 points

In a Saturday night thriller, the Sacramento Kings defeated the Orlando Magic on the road in a crucial game for both teams and their aspirations of earning a direct trip to the upcoming NBA playoffs. The match was even from start to finish but lastly, the Kings survived despite Jonathan Isaac's brilliant performance. De'Aaron Fox came up huge for Sacramento, scoring 31 points for his team's victory 109-107.

In one of the early games scheduled for this evening, the Kings traveled to Florida to face the Eastern Conference's 4th seeded Orlando Magic. Sacramento, currently 8th in the West, needed a win to not lose a step behind Phoenix (7th) and Dallas (6th) in order to maintain their hopes to avoid that scary looking play-in tournament.

Sacramento started the game better, but struggle to score over the Magic's asfixiating defense. In the second quarter, Orlando fired back, and went to halftime with a 2-point margin.

The second half was played with the same intensity, and while Orlando entered the final quarter with a slight advantage, Sacramento fought back.

With both teams playing very good defense, the game was decided perhaps by one of the league's most underrated offensive players. De'Aaron Fox scored 12 of his 31 points on the fourth. Sacramento's guard finished the game with 8 rebounds, 2 assists and 3 steals. Doing a little bit of everything for to give his team the chance to win.

Orlando had several chances to go ahead in the scoredboard with less than a minute left, but the Kings managed to dodge that bullets.

Jonathan Isaac was fantastic for the Magic, registering 25 points, 7 rebounds and 2 blocks. It was his job and Jalen Suggs' to make it difficult for the Kings. Unfortunately, Suggs struggled on offense, shooting poorly from the field, scoring only 9 points. Banchero added 22.

Fox's performance was helped by another Domantas Sabonis monster night on the boards, grabbing 14 rebounds and helping with 21 points. Keegan Murray scored 22 points.

The Kings, now with a 40-29 record, continue to put pressure on the Phoenix Suns (who are facing the Spurs later) with a 41-29 record, and the Dallas Mavericks, also at 41-29. They'll be returning to Sacramento to face the Philadelphia 76ers on Monday night.

Orlando has three days to recover from this lost, as they'll be receiving the visit of the Golden State Warriors on Wednesday night. They need to bounce back from this loss quickly if they want to remain ahead of the New York Knicks, with whom they now share the same record of 42-28.