Pistons 94 Trail Blazers 91, it’s not a typo. Detroit took down the Blazers in a gritty win Saturday night at the Palace. If had a chance to see this one, you wouldn’t recognize the Pistons team that took the floor. That’s a good thing.
Key Points:
- The Pistons went from 25 turnovers on Friday night to 11 on Saturday. It’s really simple, when they protect what’s there’s they give themselves a chance to win.
- If Walker D. Russell isn’t the feel good story of season I don’t know what is. Russell in his second NBA game showed poise and leadership on court in his limited time. He put up 3 points with 2 steals in 12 minutes on the floor. I’m wondering when they are going to start printing “The Walkman” t-shirts up at The Palace.
- We saw defense from Detroit (that worked) all night. Example in the second Frank when with Walker Russell, Wilkins, Jason Maxiell and Jonas Jerebko and Prince. Down 27-26 after one, that bunch played suffocating defense as the Pistons went on a 12-2 run.
- Don’t think this one was simple either if you check the score and saw that the Pistons were up by 16. After a Rodney Stuckey 3-pointer with 7:13 left in the third quarter gave them a 16-point lead, Detroit scored only two points over the next six minutes, during which time Portland outscored them 16-2 to cut its deficit to two points. They let that lead slip but kept at it by never folding and making defensive stops.
- That was what you call a Basketball game.
- No Ben Gordon (sore shoulder) or Will Bynum. Austin Daye recorded another DNP and let me remind you again that I’m not going to mention CV31 until whatever is wrong with him is gone and we find him on the court.
- Jonas Jerebko, who got clocked with an elbow late in the game, scored 11 points, with 5 boards and 2 blocked shots. The bloody mess that was Jonas face didn’t send him to the line, it got him the foul call which everyone on the Pistons bench wasn’t happy about. It looked bad, but Arnie fixed him right up.
- Rodney Stuckey was the star of the night leading the Pistons with 28 points, 5 assists, 4 boards in 37 minutes on the floor. By far the best Rodney showing in quite some time. If Stuck can put up games similar to this when the Pistons need him, he will silence all the critics, including this one. And don’t forget the sinister dunk!
- And how about another solid game from Rookie Brandon Knight who started right along with Rodney Stuckey, a combination that really looks good in my opinion. Knight with 14 points, a blocked shot, 3 assists and 3 boards.
Brandon Knight: “I can play off the ball and he can play off the ball. We can play off of each other. It’s a great way to play and something I’m sure we’ll look to exploit later on. It’s definitely good having two ball handlers that can both attack and create for the team.”
- Jason Maxiell is just a hard worker, sometimes his match-up works and sometimes it doesn’t. One thing is he’ll always be out there scrapping. Jason grabbed 7 board and helped significantly on D. And then there was this.
- Via NBA.com
[flashvideo file=http://nba.cdn.turner.com/nba/big/games/pistons/2012/01/21/0021100230_por_det_play4.nba_nba_576x324.flv /]
- Tayshaun Prince with 17 points on 6-for-14 shooting with 3 blocked shots on the night. With the way Tay has been playing of late it really looks like he’s getting his legs back.
- It’s really is hard to believe that they won this game, in fact if you asked me before the game I would have said they had no chance. And if I bet on sports you can be sure that I would have taken Portland in this one. Kudos for making me wrong, we appreciate it.
- Out-rebounded 38-34.
- Tight till the buzzer with the Pistons leading by three and neither team having a timeout left, Frank ordered Knight to foul Raymond Felton. Felton made both free throws, but Portland was forced to foul again and Stuckey made both free throws. Felton lost the ball on the Trail Blazers’ final possession and Greg Monroe’s expression on his face was priceless.
- I’ll just revel in in this victory, it was a long time coming. Or it just really seemed like it.
as good as it feels to get the W, were still a very bad team. but if we can play d like this and if stuck plays like this, we might just start winning again.
And it felt good to hear DEEETROIT BAASSKETBALL yesterday by mason after we won. i havent heard him say that in years!!!!!!
Huge W for the Pistons, even with $20 million worth of salary on the bench (CV, BG, Daye).
We can get better players for less salary than those bums.
hey, we beat a team with a winning record!
We’ve also beat Orlando and Indiana this year.
The leading scorers in the 4 Piston wins are as follows:
JJ x2, BG, Stuckey
We can win without BG but I don`t think win a game without Stuck.
The Pistons are .500 when Stuckey starts and finishes the game. In fact, the Pistons have won 3 in a row when Stuckey starts in finishes. All three wins have been against quality opponents, Contrary to a lot of what I read, Stuckey makes the players around him better, its been the players around him that have dragged him down. With Knight, with Monroe, with Prince playing healthy, with JJ, that’s finally started to turn around. Also I appreciate Maxiell was out there trying and I like him as a person. But on both ends of the court there were lots of times he had rebounding position and was just out jumped or out muscled for the ball. That was another major story last night.
Was it just me, or did Walker Russel show flashes of an old school Chucky Atkins?
I was not impressed. There are still glaring flaws in how our players play.
We have the highest turnover percentage in the whole NBA. Almost 29 turnovers a game, it is pretty disgusting that it is that bad. That is a huge problem
Also we are 24th in the league in Field Goal percentage and assists. That says that we probably miss most of the shots off a pass. This is the hole in our plays
We are second to last in allowing the other team to score on possession.
Though we won last night a lot of it has to do with Stuckey being on a hot streak, not because we bested by being a better team that night. We had made less mistakes, but still less productive in rebounds and assists than the blazers.
Ya its called a new coach, a new system, no practice, two weeks of trainig camp/preseason, a rookie pg, and an injured pgx2 sg pf, and a sf playing overseas (and playing extremely well) a sf/sg/pf/skinny not sure what position player not playing as well as he should and not playing at all, on a compressed season. It will get better but probably not alot better till the offseason. Then we b getting back singler and a lottery pick to add in.
We need that new lottery pick and to waive or trade some of our deadweights.
i dont care what you say, the better team won!
So what if rodney was hot, we got a lot of players that can get hot, Ben gordon theoretically could go 10 for 10 from the 3 point, monroe could post up a monster game inside, with 5+ assists and a double double, Jerebko can get a ridiculous game, when it’s going his way and he’s sinking all his shots he starts to get a lot more foul calls.
So sure, rodney got hot but that’s what can happen on this team. don’t belittle it.
dont be hating the better team won!
You think the blazers went home and said “Oh they just got lucky”
NO WAY. Their coach sat the down and showed his team tape of every single thing the pistons did that beat them, things we did better. What a great game.
So rodney sunk a lot of 3 point attempts he normally doesnt make, the reason he got those looks is because he broke down their defense going to the point so nobody bothered him on the perimeter.
Lucky Stuckey!
There’s no need to put down the high that everyone got from the win. We all know that the Pistons still have some ways to go before becoming the playoff caliber team that they used to be. Let’s just all be happy that the team has shown some flashes of brilliance and just rally behind them.
GO DETROIT!
1 win does not mean we are going to the playoffs any time soon,
but it is encouraging to finally beat a decent team.
Our young players are improving and the vets are playing better.
Next year hopefully Gore will let Joe D. can make some FA moves and Dumars can draft 2 quality players.
We need 2 starters at PF and SF to go with Stuckey, Knight and Monroe.
Prince and JJ would improve our current bench. We need a decent 6th man SG if we get rid of Gordon.
YEAAAAAHHHH
To by Portland friend: I’N YOUR F$@(ING FACE
it seems like you guys cant be impressed. when we lose you bitch when we win you say we got lucky. I wonder if you guys are really fans of the pistons? Great win lets hope we can utilize more players especially ones we seems to waste money on.
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