Sacramento Kings win Las Vegas Summer League championship

Roy McCallum led the Sacramento Kings to the 2014 Summer League championship with a 29-point performance

The Sacramento Kings triumphed over the Houston Rockets 77-68 in NBA's Las Vegas Summer League tournament finals Monday night, led by 29 points from Ray McCallum.

It was a back-and-forth battle between Houston and Sacramento, with the Kings having the best individual scoring performance against a more even offensive fight from the Rockets. But Sacramento's late push after a scoring drought held Houston in check and got them to victory with a 19-3 ending run.

If the Summer League title was decided by the most exciting play (shouldn't it?!), Houston probably would have won, however.

Ray McCallum cut his way to the basket and hit some threes to help Sacramento find an early lead, which later dwindled. His quickness and finishing ability were tough to guard for Houston, in spite of relatively weak scoring complements to get help from.

Houston, meanwhile, hung with the Kings for much of the game, before going on a strong run in the early stages of the fourth quarter, led by their Motiejunas-Nick Johnson-Isaiah Canaan trio. As Sacramento's offense struggled to find its rhythm again, Houston got out to a fairly considerable lead.

But Sacramento rallied, with buckets by Nik Stauskas, McCallum and McLemore leading the way to a big 9-0 run to put them back up with a minute to go. McCallum's near-half-court shot at the shot-clock buzzer was a huge difference-maker, and gave the Kings a big advantage by forcing the Rockets into shouldering the burden of extending the game.

Though Motiejunas' late layup helped make up a little ground, they couldn't help but foul McCallum, whose free throws gave them a significant 6-point lead with 34 seconds left.

Quincy Acy received MVP chants as he helped Sacramento get their first championship of the Vivek Ranadive era. And surely not the last.

THE CHAMPS ARE HERE http://ift.tt/WtZblG

— Robby Kalland (@RKalland) July 22, 2014

Oh, wait.

"One day the Sacramento Kings are going to win a championship and we'll remember this as the first step." Vivek Ranadive on LVSL title

— Ben Golliver (@BenGolliver) July 22, 2014

LET THE CONFETTI RAIN UPON THEM

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