The Sacramento rookie established himself as a rare lead scoring force alongside Malik Monk, all despite falling to Houston.
The Sacramento Kings grew accustomed to Zach LaVine, Russell Westbrook or DeMar DeRozan leading the scoring charge. Maxime Raynaud changed that narrative in Houston on Wednesday.
The rookie center/forward dropped 25 points on the Rockets, but the Kings still took a lopsided 121-95 defeat inside the Toyota Center.
Raynaud never even earned the start against the fellow Western Conference representative. Yet still logged 32 minutes and exploded with his first-ever scoring spree in a live NBA game.
Known for his inside game at Stanford, Raynaud earned his first basket behind the arc -- nailing a 26-foot bank shot off the Westbrook pass. Those points tied the game at eight and occurred at the 8:07 mark of the first quarter.
Raynaud came back at the 5:41 mark of the first with another long range attempt. This time he made a 27-footer with Westbrook again dishing the ball to the rookie.
He finished the first producing 12 points off the bench -- featuring a late driving layup and two-point shot attempt via assists from Nique Clifford. Sacramento trailed 28-26 after the first.
The visiting Kings then outscored Houston 26-23 in the second quarter. Although Raynaud settled for one basket during that sequence on a five-point shot attempt at the 4:31 mark.
Raynaud's sudden development has caught the attention of ABC 10 Sacramento sports reporter Matt George.
"Maxime Raynaud's improvement in a month has been astonishing. He looks so much more comfortable," George posted on the social media website X, formerly Twitter. "We already knew this with his Stanford background, but he's super smart. You can see it in how he plays."
Even his college alma mater shouted him out on the same social media platform.
But unfortunately, Raynaud's scoring outburst wasn't enough. Houston fully took control of the game in the third quarter by outscoring Sacramento 36-19.
Raynaud finished with six rebounds and blocked one basket. He wasn't the only one reaching the 25-point plateau, though. Malik Monk joined him by scoring 25 as well -- pulling off the feat on 10-of-19 field goal shooting and earning 30 minutes off the bench.
Sacramento's starters combined for 33 points -- but LaVine got bottled to only two points in 19 minutes. Drew Eubanks settled for the same point total too among the starters. Keegan Murray scored five. Westbrook and DeRozan scored 12 points apiece.
Sacramento now drops to 5-17 overall and is 2-10 in away games.