SACRAMENTO, Calif. — When the Sacramento Kings drafted Jason Thompson last June, then-teammate Ron Artest had a message to share with the young big man out of Rider University.

"I called him and immediately told him we were going to win a championship," Artest said late Thursday night from his seat in the visitor's locker room at Arco Arena. "He was like, 'Yeah, yeah, we're going to win."'

There is no title talk in Sacramento anymore, however. And in truth, Artest was alone in that discussion during most of his two-plus seasons with the Kings that ended last summer.

But as his Houston Rockets won, 115-98, in front of an announced crowd of 12,897 to improve their playoff position in the tightly contested Western Conference, Artest's presence — not to mention that of former Kings coach Rick Adelman — was the latest reminder as to how far the home team is from even pondering the possibility of standing atop the NBA's podium.

Since the August trade that sent Artest to the Rockets and netted the Kings Bobby Jackson, rookie Donte' Greene, Houston's first-round pick and approximately $1 million in cash, they have gone from a team that scrapped its way to 38 wins last season to a squad that maintained its hold on the league's worst record. At 16-62, the Kings remained two wins "ahead" of the Clippers and Washington and thus the higher possibility of landing the No. 1 pick in June.

With four games to go, they have already secured their spot as the worst Sacramento Kings team and remained on track to finish as the worst team in franchise history. The Cincinnati Royals teams of 1958-59 (19-53) and 1959-60 (19-56) hold that distinction.

The Kings also fell to 11-29 at home this season and will fall far below the worst Sacramento-era home record of 16-25 (1989-90, 1992-93). They will also finish with the worst home mark since the Cincinnati Royals went 9-21 at home during the 1959-60 season. If the Kings win against San Antonio on Sunday, they will edge those Royals in the winning percentage category and avoid posting the worst home record, percentage-wise, in franchise history.

Against the Rockets, there was rare incentive to win as it related to the draft because of the Artest trade. While the pick that Houston gave up in the deal is lottery-protected, the Rockets have already secured playoff position and assured the Kings that the selection will be theirs. The only mystery from here on out is where they finish and where that leaves the Kings' pick.

The win left Houston in third place in the West and with the sixth-best record in the league, a spot that would hypothetically give the Kings the 25th pick. Yet with three games remaining (at Golden State, vs. New Orleans and at Dallas), Houston could still fall behind Portland, San Antonio and the Hornets with a three-game slide and improve the pick considerably.

Artest, however, did his part to avoid helping his former team. After a first half in which Thompson, Spencer Hawes and Francisco Garcia had 39 of their 55 points combined on 16-of-28 shooting and the Kings led 55-49 at the break, Artest went to work against a Kings defense that took a colossal dive after his offseason departure.

Artest scored the Rockets' first eight points of the third quarter and the Rockets dominated the period in which they outscored the Kings 36-20 while hitting 15 of 23 shots. Artest — who was playing at Arco Arena for the first time in the regular season since the trade — had 26 points on 10-of-18 shooting and hit 3 of 5 three-pointers. It was, in other words, more of the same in recent months from the two-way talent.