The previous season, Kings guard Davion Mitchell made his NBA playoff debut when Sacramento fell to the Golden State Warriors in a seven-game first-round series.Mitchell has played high-stakes basketball before, though, as he made two trips to the NCAA Tournament and won a national championship in 2021 while playing for the Baylor Bears. This was in addition to last year’s postseason performance.
On the most recent episode of “Kings Central,” Mitchell discussed the distinction between winning a championship game with Baylor and taking on the Warriors in Game 7 of the previous year’s first round with the Kings, as reported by NBC Sports California’s Kyle Draper.
Mitchell told Draper, “College was a little different for me because that’s when COVID happened.” “While attendance at the games began, it wasn’t at capacity. I believe that Game 7—against the Warriors—is the biggest match I have ever participated in.
In the final game, Baylor defeated the Gonzaga Bulldogs 86-70 to win the first NCAA basketball title on the Waco, Texas, campus. Mitchell and his Bears teammates gained national attention as a result.
However, as the third-year guard for the Kings pointed out, the COVID-19 pandemic’s effects lessened the excitement at Lucas Oil Stadium during the 2021 NCAA championship game, making it ultimately insufficient to match the raucous Golden 1 Center and Chase Center audiences during the 2023 NBA playoffs.
For Mitchell, nothing compares to playing in a win-or-go-home situation against Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, and the Warriors in Sacramento, but he still had a great time during his March Madness run.
Mitchell said to Draper, “[The national championship] was still a big game because people don’t talk about who came in second.” “The Baylor family’s legacy, and Coach [Scott] Drew’s achievement in winning a national championship—he was also going through a bit of a drought. He spent sixteen years at Baylor. The 16-year drought for the [Kings] is amusing. Getting it for him alone was a nice thing.
“Now that people are aware of how Baylor develops players—and how they develop players as men, too—a lot more players are considering Baylor.”
Before the Kings selected Mitchell ninth overall in the 2021 NBA Draft, the guard averaged 13.5 points, 5.8 assists, 2.8 rebounds, and 1.7 steals per game during Baylor’s March Madness run.
And Mitchell broke his coach’s 16-year title drought, just as he did when he helped Sacramento make it to the NBA playoffs for the first time since 2006.
Though Mitchell understands that his entire collegiate career was spent preparing for the chance to play in the NBA, he will always be remembered as a Baylor legend.
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