There's a light at the end of the tunnel Kings fans. According to a report by the Sacramento Bee's Ailene Voisin, the Kings are having "intense conversations" with George Karl about the head coaching vacancy. This follows Aaron Bruski's tweet yesterday that he had heard that the Kings were ramping up their coaching search.

This is the change that many fans were hoping for when Malone was dismissed in mid-December. So why has it taken so long for the Kings to seriously engage Karl in talks? Well according to Voisin, a lot of it has to do with the Kings complete lack of competitiveness lately, which has culminated in a record of 6-18 under Corbin. Sacramento has also lost 10 of their last 11 games, with many of them being blowout losses.

Timing-wise, installing a new coach soon makes a lot of sense given that the All-Star break is coming up and the Kings will have a week off.

Voisin lists a couple hurdles in signing Karl however. The first is financial, as he's expected to command an annual salary of above $4 million. Second, the Kings aren't the only team pursuing Karl any more as the Magic just fired Jacque Vaughn and other teams with better rosters could have coaching vacancies at the end of the year.

Sacramento is also interested in Alvin Gentry and Nate McMillan, as well as Tom Thibodeau and Scott Brooks if they're let go by their respective teams. McMillan is the only one who could join the team this year.

Voisin says nothing is imminent, but even still, it's nice to see the team seemingly taking action after appearing so listless and directionless since the firing of Mike Malone. Hopefully that results in a new coach, and soon.