After living out of a suitcase for almost the entire season — five of the first seven games were on the road — the Pistons will play five of their next six at the Palace, starting with tonight’s game against the New Orleans/Oklahoma City Hornets, hereafter referred to as NOOCH. 
On to the crib-sheet:
Who to watch: Let’s start with Chris Paul, who has drawn comparisons to Isiah Thomas and has quickly ascended into a small group of elite NBA point guards. He’s averaging 17.3 points and 9.3 assists — he has the potential to murder Detroit’s defense if the Pistons don’t tighten up on the perimeter. If they can contain him (and he’s been inconsistent this year — just two points last night), the Pistons should be okay — no one else on the team averages even 2.0 assists per game.
They’re never out of the game: No lead is safe against NOOCH, not when they have the league’s premier three-point shooting threat. Peja Stojakovic leads the team in scoring by getting almost half of his points from beyond the arc.
What happened last year? Things got a little uncomfortable for the Hornets the last time they came to the Palace, and it has nothing to do with their eight-point loss: the Palace sewers backed up into the visiting team’s locker room, which prevented the Hornets from taking post-game showers. As for the actual game, Antonio McDyess was a beast (26 points, 14 boards), playing starters’ minutes while filling in for Rasheed Wallace, who missed the game after being suspended for too many technical fouls.
Injuries? The word is that Rip Hamilton will try to play tonight but won’t make a decision until shortly before tipoff. The range of motion on his hyperextended elbow is improving but definitely not yet 100%. Complicating matters is the news that Lindsey Hunter sprained his right ankle in practice (not the problematic left ankle that he had surgery on last year). He’s almost certainly out, which means *gulp* more backup point guard minutes for Flip Murray.
The Hornets will be without starting forward David West, who’s still nursing a forearm injury, and Tyson Chandler, who lost a tooth and suffered a concussion after taking an elbow to the head last night. This is a lucky break for Detroit: Chandler leads NOOCH in rebounding and West is the second-leading scorer and rebounder. With any luck, Detroit will exploit the suddenly undersized and undermanned NOOCH frontcourt by dominating the glass.
Game starts at 7:30 on FSN — as always, leave your pre-/in-/-post game thoughts in the comments.
Ryan Fields on FSN says that Rip will be back tonight.
i am preparing my series of “disappointment” emoticons. if we can’t exploit this team in the middle tonight, i may punish myself by taking in the new tayshaun/snoop dogg joint.
nazr mohammad was just taken offensively by a guy named “hilton.”
Wish I could see the game, but I gotta catch the premiere of Daybreak. I’ll keep my fingers crossed. I refuse to use Yahoo! GameChannel anymore. It’s a piece of crap.
Hornets are buggy
Pistons must stomp them flat (squish!)
If not…goodbye, all.
i guess people punish themselves in different ways, rocky.
Well, scratch that about Lindsey Hunter sitting out — here he is to finish out the first quarter.
wow. it’s like ben never left. at least on the free throw line.
I did it. I used that blasted GameChannel. Down by 11 going into halftime. What’s up with Sheed not hitting his shots? He said he’d be more in the post this year, but so far he’s thrown up three treys (not hitting any), and only one two-pointer.
We look old and slow!
ron said it best. we look old and slow. especially on the glass. though that move chauncey just made was pretty nice.
it is ALWAYS SOMEONE’S responsibility to box out the free throw shooter. ALWAYS. i really hate watching this shell of a team.
DAMN IT. What the hell happened? Admittingly Detroit played very well in the second half, but two things. DEFENCE? We used to be pretty good at this you know. I am feeling the pain of not having Big Ben. I am positive that that last free throw would have been ours had he been guarding the paint, same with countless rebounds we could have had. Nazr just can’t do it.
Another thing, we tied the game about five to six times yet EACH time we failed to actually make a decent lead out of that. What the hell is going on? Was Chauncey the only one on the floor tonight?
Another thought worth mentioning, Sheed did NOT have to attempt a three on the last possession of the game we had. He took too many thre e pointer attempts. Granted he pulled us back into the game with some of his shots, but WAAY too many threes.
I am pretty disappointed but not into a panic mode yet. Other elite teams are having tough starts too (Miami, Dallas, Chicago, Phoenix). But we really have to pull this together. These are just embarrassing losses though we did play with some fire tonight in the second half. Lets hope to see better games
DEEEEEEETTTTROIT BASKETBALL.
kart go: I agree with you about Sheed’s last shot. He went 2-7 from beyond the arc and 3-4 from inside. He obviously picks his shot based on his gut, but I wouldn’t mind seeing him tethered to the block down low.
This is really pathetic. We need to turn things around.
Well, I’d rather lose a game by one point than by 30 or whatever that blowout loss to Golden State was.
I was at this game. The first half looked like they were playing in pre-season mode. The second half was great… good energy. When we started playing defense it fueled our fast break. But like LB always said… if you are fighting from behind you can’t make mistakes. (boxing out, tough foul calls)
oh and the rebounding was for sh%t! Zero effort = zero offensive boards.
2 cents
-Tim