Just like they were as Kentucky Wildcats, six years ago. In the present day, their Sacramento Kings are tied 2-2 with the Golden State Warriors in a vigorous, nationally broadcasted, first-round playoff series. Thus, we have NBA content merchants sprinkling videos of De’Aaron Fox and Malik Monk’s UK highlights around social media, or Allie LaForce presenting this tidbit to TNT viewers as play resumes. It’s easy to treat these instances with a gatekeeping cynicism – real fans already knew about this. But those highlights are awesome, and the history Fox and Monk have is a neat one, no matter how mainstream it becomes.
There has not since been a men’s college basketball team as electrifying as their 2016-17 Wildcats, also featuring Bam Adebayo. Thanks to Fox and Monk sprinting the ball up the floor on every possession, UK played at a breakneck pace that thrust some classic battles upon us. Lonzo Ball went into Rupp Arena, amidst all the Ball v. Fox hype of the 2017 NBA draft cycle, and shushed the crowd in a 97-92 UCLA win. Three months later, Fox hung 39 on his head to knock UCLA out of the NCAA Tournament. There was also the time Monk dropped 47(!) on UNC in a 103-100(!!) win in late December. Yet, three months later, Luke Maye got it back in blood, hitting his famous buzzer beater to send Kentucky home in an Elite 8 all-timer.
Fox sat in the locker room after that loss, hugging Adebayo and sobbing during an interview. That intimate moment, where Fox continually repeats how much he loves his guys, is one of the more touching moments college basketball has produced, for me, and emblematic of what made that Kentucky team so magnetic. Monk punched air and screamed after every big play, whether by him or a teammate. Fox, whose competitiveness was a tad more reserved, showing up in ways like guarding Ball full-court in their matchups, would only join Monk in outward celebration during their most euphoric moments. The many that argued that college basketball was losing its soul in a one-and-done era nearing the creation of NIL clearly weren’t watching Fox and Monk at Kentucky.
The reunion of De’Aaron Fox and Malik Monk in Sacramento isn’t just one of this postseason’s best storylines because it feels nice, though. They’re hooping. The same two hair-raising athletes that arrived in Kentucky when Kevin Durant arrived in Golden State are now looking to drive a stake through the heart of a basketball dynasty. You grow up fast.
The league’s best regular season offense has an ORTG of only 111.9 over their first four games against the Warriors, just a 40th percentile mark. However, when Fox and Monk share the court, that number balloons to 121.7 without much defensive slippage. (Monk in particular has some ridiculous on/off splits, SAC’s offense has been 18 points/100 better with him. 18!) Overall, Fox/Monk lineups have played just fewer than half of this series’ possessions, but are out-scoring the Dubs by nearly nine points/100.
Some of this is due to the non-Monk Kings, particularly Kevin Huerter and Harrison Barnes, missing just about every 3-pointer they take. But Monk’s only shooting a mediocre 35% from deep against the Dubs himself. In a beautiful, full-circle moment, the questions Fox and Monk have answered from their Kentucky days has turned them into a dynamic, complementary backcourt, one that Sacramento is depending on.
Monk has always been an explosive athlete with outside shooting touch, the question for him was if he could turn those skills into halfcourt creation reps. The perennial demand of his archetype: Can he slow down and incorporate some craft into his game? The answer, clearly, is yes.
The fun part about Monk’s growth as a creator is not that he’s overhauled his offensive game, rather the opposite. By playing with varied pace and then refining the details of that pace – screen usage as a guard, eye manipulation, etc. – Monk allows his athleticism and touch to shine, and now we’re wowed again.
The screen usage, specifically, is popping vs. Golden State. At this rate, there may not be a more feared screen rejector in the league by the start of next season. Monk has seemingly rejected as many ball-screens as he’s actually, you know, used in this series, but the results have been fantastic.
Fantastic…and fun! Cross-spin, pound-cross, killer cross, Monk is cooking the only way he knows how. Yet, as those clips evidence, Golden State can’t throw their best perimeter defender on the court, whoever that may be at the time, on him. Why? Well, that guy has to worry about De’Aaron Fox.
Fox always did and still does face questions as an outside shooter, and therefore, an off-ball player. But his 32% mark from deep on the year belies the quality of shooter he’s really turned into. Forget the Game 2 dagger to give the Kings a late, insurmountable 107-101 after being 1-9 from deep up to that point. How about standing up to a vintage Steph Curry bomb with a catch-and-shoot off of, of course, a Monk drive-and-kick:
Fox and Monk are now largely interchangeable, or at least capable, as offensive creators and spacers. Late in the first quarter of Game 4, Andrew Wiggins was guarding Fox, forcing Moses Moody to knuckle up and stay in front of Monk. He, somewhat predictably, could not avoid the inevitability of Monk successfully rejecting a screen. Meanwhile, on the weak side, Fox slyly lifted from the corner to the wing, creating a more open but more functionally difficult pass for Monk to make off of his drive. He made it anyway:
Fox and Monk have each done the work to make this backcourt work once again, this time in an NBA setting, six years later, without even knowing it. This is, after all, Monk’s first season in SacTown, and each of their first playoff appearances. Not only have they covered the holes in their games, but they’ve covered each other too, allowing for more classic Fox and Monk magic.
With the ex-Wildcats, the Kings can push the ball up court with either one, just like we saw at Kentucky. Having two speedy ball-handlers on the court, rather than just one release valve, makes a world of difference for Sacramento.
- Transition points/100, total: 106.6
- Transition points/100 (Fox/Monk minutes): 126.7
In transition, the fellas play the classics. Here, Fox sprints the ball up court, even after the Kings have to take the ball out of the net. No problem. He collapses the defense severely on his jaunt toward the paint, and the Warriors are out of whack immediately in the possession, to the point where nobody notices Monk relocating along the perimeter. Well, nobody besides Fox:
This isn’t (just) small sample size theatrics, or a case of streaky shooting from Monk. He and his point-guard-for-life have developed into such a cohesive backcourt that they are not only working on an NBA floor, a thought that would’ve brought a tear to my eye six years ago, but they might be Sacramento’s best answer for the defending champions. Of course, things aren’t all rosy in the City of Trees. Fox, in a monumental Game 5, plans on playing through an avulsion fracture in his dominant index finger. Monk, for all his chaotic brilliance in this series to date, dipped into some poor, old habits late in Game 4 by being a little overzealous early in the shot-clock and kamikaze-ing Kings possessions. Head Coach Mike Brown alluded to it in his post-game presser after Game 4, saying his guys were “driving into two, sometimes three guys, in transition and begging for a call, and we can’t continue to do that.”
Regardless, what Fox and Monk are doing in Sacramento must be appreciated, even if their season may be as little as two days away from over. Their Kentucky days, which will live on in highlights and quick winks to the real NBA fans for knowing they existed, were so much more than just that. Their Sacramento days are becoming the perfect epilogue to that era. As basketball players, their improvements have made this pairing possible once again; their current synergy is deeper than it was, improved in the ways that every 19-year-old hopes to improve in by the time they’re 25. They can no longer be pigeon-holed, limited to specific functions; their relationship is fuller, more complex and meaningful because of it. Kings basketball has been dripping in that incalculable ‘something special’ all season long, and for it, they owe a big thank you to De’Aaron Fox and Malik Monk. As basketball fans, so do we.
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