Tonight, at 7:30 p.m., your 34-29 Los Angeles Lakers, the Western Conference’s No. 9 seed, will host the 34-26 Sacramento Kings, the West’s No. 7 seed.

It’s a clash of two top-heavy play-in prospects. A year removed from notching a 48-24 record and the conference’s third seed (and falling in an epic-but-ultimately-unremarkable seven-game series against the Golden State Warriors), the Kings haven’t actually gotten any worse from last year’s model (and neither, one could argue, have the Lakers), but the rest of the West has just gotten better.

Per Vegas sports book aggregator The Action Network, Los Angeles is a modest 2.5-point favorite to beat Sacramento tonight. Look for an awakened LeBron James and Anthony Davis to do their darnedest to stop a considerably more three-point-laden offensive effort with size up front and for LA to pull out a hard-fought win, with both its All-Stars logging big minutes.

Look for another great night for Anthony Davis, who should eat 2023 Kings All-Star center Domantas Sabonis’ lunch. Though Sabonis is an unbelievable offensive presence (he’s a superb distributor and shooter, plus being a prodigious rebounder and scorer inside), he’s a dreadful defender and should give AD plenty of area to feast.