During the first decade of the NBA, when the Kings and Lakers were based in Rochester, New York and Minneapolis respectively (with the former then being known as the Royals), both teams played each other in the postseason five times.

The Royals would then go through various periods of futility and success, with a relocation to Cincinnati in 1957, a period of playoff appearances between 1962 and 1967 led by MVP point guard Oscar Robertson, another location to Kansas City, Missouri in 1972 (with a part-time residency in Omaha, Nebraska until 1975) with minimal playoff success (while renaming to the Kings to avoid confusion with the Kansas City Royals), and then finally relocating to Sacramento, California in 1985, where they remain today.

Meanwhile, the Lakers would relocate to their present-day home of Los Angeles in 1960, winning six more championships between 1972 and 1988, largely with the Showtime team led by MVPs Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, coach Pat Riley, owner Jerry Buss, and general manager Jerry West.

The Kings were coached by Rick Adelman and led by Chris Webber, Vlade Divac, Peja Stojaković, Jason Williams, Bobby Jackson, among others.

During the 2001 offseason, the Kings traded Williams to the Memphis Grizzlies for Mike Bibby, who would create more stability at point guard.

The Lakers won Game 6 106–102, attempting 18 more free throws than the Kings in the fourth quarter, and went on to win the series, and eventually the NBA championship.

The document claimed that Donaghy told federal agents that in order to increase television ratings and ticket sales, "top executives of the NBA sought to manipulate games using referees".

[7] The Kings went to Staples Center and dominated Game 3 to regain home-court advantage, leading by as many as 27 and never trailing.

However, the Lakers cut the lead to 14 at halftime with a Samaki Walker 3-pointer at the buzzer that should not have counted (replay was not used at the time), and to 7 after three quarters.

Divac knocked the ball away from the hoop in an attempt to run out the clock, but instead it wound up going to a wide open Robert Horry behind the 3 point line, who hit the 3 over Webber at the buzzer to give the Lakers an improbable victory, which tied the series going back to Sacramento.

[9] As the series shifted back to Sacramento for Game 5, the Kings trailed almost the entire fourth quarter, but a jump shot by Bibby off a screen with 8.2 seconds left gave them the lead and was the game-winner in a 92–91 win.

For example, Wilbon pointed out that Kobe Bryant did not get a foul called on him after elbowing Mike Bibby in front of an official.

In the final ten seconds with Los Angeles up 99–98, Peja Stojaković air-balled a wide open 3, and O'Neal was fouled on the rebound.

Sacramento was undone by poor free throw shooting (16–30 from the line), a horrid 2–20 from behind the arc, and a seeming unwillingness for anyone other than Bibby to take crucial shots down the stretch.

Meanwhile, in the following postseason, the Kings would lose the Western Conference Semifinals to the Dallas Mavericks after Webber tore his ACL.

Despite not meeting in the postseason since the 2002 Western Conference Finals to date, bitterness between the teams remain due to the series.

Both teams were in the 2024 NBA Play-In Tournament, with the Lakers and Kings finishing the regular season as the 8th and 9th seed, respectively.