Precious Achiuwa had a career night to propel the Sacramento Kings to their fifth road win of the season and their first since early December.
Achiuwa scored a career-high 29 points to lead the Kings to a 130-121 victory over the Dallas Mavericks on Thursday at American Airlines Center.
The Mavericks stormed back from an 18-point deficit to get within two with less than two minutes to play, but clutch baskets from Nique Clifford, Daeqwon Plowden and Achiuwa helped the Kings hold on for the win.
Maxime Raynaud had 22 points and six rebounds for the Kings (14-47), who had not won on the road since beating the Miami Heat on Dec. 6.
Plowden, a two-way player who has spent much of the season with the G League Stockton Kings, matched his career high with 19 points while going 7 of 7 from the field with three 3-pointers. Devin Carter had 15 points, seven rebounds, five assists and four steals.
Naji Marshall had 36 points, 10 rebounds and six assists for the Mavericks (21-37), who were missing rookie Cooper Flagg.
Khris Middleton scored 17 points for Dallas. Brandon Williams had 16.
The Kings led 42-28 after shooting 56.7% on 30 field-goal attempts with no turnovers in the first quarter. The Mavericks shot 55.6%, but they committed six turnovers and took only 18 shots.
Achiuwa led the way in the opening period, putting up 14 points and seven rebounds while going 6 of 8 from the field with two 3-pointers.
The Kings led by as many as 18 in the second quarter before carrying a 68-56 advantage into the halftime break. Achiuwa had 21 points in the opening half, establishing a new career high for points in a half while finishing one shy of his season high. He went 9 of 11 from the field and 3 of 3 from 3-point range.
The Mavericks staged an 11-0 run to cut the deficit to three in the third period before the Kings responded with a 14-2 run to go up 76-51. Sacramento led 100-88 at the end of the third quarter and went up 110-93 early in the fourth, but Dallas came back to get within two on a three-point play by Williams with 1:56 remaining.
A putback basket by Achiuwa, a 3-pointer by Plowden and a floater by Clifford helped the Kings secure the win.
Keegan Murray injury
Kings forward Keegan Murray was ruled out for Thursday’s game after spraining his left ankle in Wednesday’s loss to the Houston Rockets.
Murray returned last week after missing 20 games with the same injury. He appeared in four games before reinjuring the ankle against the Rockets.
Up next
The Kings will conclude a five-game road trip when they visit the Los Angeles Lakers on Sunday at Crypto.com Arena.
The Lakers (34-23) were coming off back-to-back losses to the Boston Celtics and Orlando Magic going into Thursday’s game against the Phoenix Suns.
The Lakers beat the Kings 127-120 on Oct. 26 in Sacramento and 125-101 on Dec. 28 in Los Angeles. The Kings beat the Lakers 124-112 on Jan. 12 in Sacramento.
Related Stories from Sacramento Bee
The Sacramento Bee
Jason Anderson is The Sacramento Bee’s Kings beat writer. He is a Sacramento native and a graduate of Fresno State, where he studied journalism and college basketball under the late Jerry Tarkanian.