I always thought Nazr Mohammed got something of a raw deal with the Pistons, so I’m happy to see him flourishing with the Bobcats. Since being moved, he’s averaged 10 points and almost eight boards in 24 minutes a game — and in his first game against the Pistons last month down in Charlotte, he went off for 19 and 13. Will he come through with more fireworks tonight (6pm, FSN)? We’ll see.
One thing I’m curious about is how Mohammed will be received by the Palace crowd. Will he be cheered? Booed? Or simply ignored? I have a hunch he’ll mildly booed if anything, not that I think he deserved it. No, he was never happy with his playing time, but who would be? He was brought in under the guise of being a starter but was never allowed to play more than 15 minutes a game and was all but forgotten once Chris Webber arrived. But through it all he remained professional and was never a disruptive force in the locker room.
I said before that stopping Matt Carroll was key for the Pistons in stopping the Bobcats, and in hindsight I’m going to pretend it wasn’t completely tongue-in-cheek. Carroll scored just four points — all at once after being fouled on a three-pointer — in 20 minutes of action.
When the Pistons played the Bobcats the first three times this year, Carroll was just another guy off the bench, so holding him to four points shouldn’t be considered all that great of an accomplishment. But given his Piston-killing tendencies as well as the fact that he had been averaging better than 17 points a game for the month of January, I’m very satisfied with how the Pistons contained him.
Of course, I can’t say the same for Gerald Wallace (29 points, 11 rebounds) and Emeka Okafor (17 points, 16 rebounds), or even Raymond Felton (17 points, eight assists). Those three racked up the numbers on a defensively challenged squad from the Detroit, and if they could have gotten a little more out of Carroll and even average production from Adam Morrison (six points, 2-9 shooting), the Pistons probably would have lost their third game of the season to the Bobcats.
Offensively, Detroit still suffered through droughts now and again, but in the end Chris Webber (19 points), Rasheed Wallace (20) and Rip Hamilton (22) paced the team while receiving only nominal scoring punch from the bench. I’m not going to get too excited about the front-court production: it’s should be noted that Charlotte started four guys listed at 6-7 or shorter, with Okafor (6-10) anchoring the middle. As much as anything, I’m guessing that’s why Rasheed and Webber shot a combined 14-18 from the field — they were often at least two or three inches taller than the guy they were going up against.
But despite the size advantage, Detroit got killed on the boards 42-31. Those numbers are partly skewed by the fact Detroit shot 52% from the field, but time and again they gave up far too many defensive rebounds.
Flip Murray got the dreaded DNP-CD as Lindsey Hunter handled backup point guard duties, scoring six with two dimes in 13 minutes. Jason Maxiell played only three and a half minutes, which is shame considering Charlotte’s undersized frontline — Flip Saunders left a lot of uneaten babies on the court with that decision. Even so, in that much time he still found time to block a shot, grab a rebound, hand out an assist … and commit two fouls.
As you can see from the GameFlow, this was a close game in which Detroit was never able to pull away until the fourth. That’s as good as any time to do it, I suppose, but a little more defensive effort could have made things a bit easier.
But here’s the good news: with the win, the Pistons pulled ahead for the No. 1 seed in the East, currently sporting a .600 winning percentage (take that, Darryl!) and sitting a half-game ahead of the Wizards — who, incidentally, will be at the Palace on Friday. Talk about nice timing — that should be a really interesting game, though Detroit’s inability to contain Charlotte’s top three admittedly has me worried about the Wizards’ Big Three of Gilbert Arenas, Caron Butler and Antawn Jamison.
Tonight the Pistons take on Matt Carroll (he’s the guy on the far-right).
They’ll face some of his Bobcats teammates, sure, but it’s Matt Carroll I’m most concerned about. Behind his deceiving Pennsylvania school-boy smile is a cold-hearted Pistons killer — he’s already led the Bobcats to two wins over the Pistons this year, which is two more than I expected.
The Pistons were held to eight points in the second quarter — their lowest-scoring quarter of the season — and watched a nine-point lead turn into a 10-point deficit.
“I don’t know if we can take any credit for that,” Charlotte coach Bernie Bickerstaff said.
The worst part is, the Pistons shot a whopping 56% from the field the night before, and in the third quarter of that game made eight consecutive shots. On Wednesday, they couldn’t buy a bucket to save their lives. It took the Bobcats less than three minutes to erase the nine-point deficit and take the lead, and it took the Pistons over four minutes to finally hit a basket.
A lot of people will call this a lack of effort, and maybe that’s what it is. But to me, it just looked like the law of averages slapping them upside the head. I’m not going to go back and re-watch this just to analyze the quality of shots, but I don’t recall many mind-numbing mistakes, just a whole lot of bricks.
In other news, Rasheed Wallace came off the bench for the second night in a row, but it’s not why you might think: From the Detroit Free Press:
Earlier in the day, he said keeping Wallace on the bench wouldn’t be a disciplinary move this time around. It would be more of a precautionary, injury-related move.
“‘Sheed has not played his best basketball lately,” Saunders said, “and part of the reason is because he’s not totally healthy. This can be a way for us to know we’re going to limit his minutes to start with because he’s only going to be able to play 30 minutes a game.
“So right now, until we get him physically where he needs to be, it might be a situation where it will benefit him but also benefit us.”
Wallace has struggled all season with ankle issues that stem from a sprained ankle in last May’s playoffs. He missed two games — Dec. 16 and 17th — on the inactive list but has fought through the pain ever since.
Sheed ended up playing 33 minutes with 13 points, six boards, three steals and a pair of blocks. Jason Maxiell, meanwhile, played 27 minutes and finished with nine points, seven boards and two blocks. And in perhaps his quietest performance of the year, Antonio McDyess was held scoreless in 11 minutes.
Rip Hamilton (23 points, six assists) once again led the team in scoring, and Tayshaun Prince (19) followed up Tuesday’s excellent performance with a solid game. Trailing nine with three minutes left, the Pistons made a mini-run to cut Charlotte’s lead down to four in the span of a minute and a half. But then Matt Carroll drew a Carlos Delfino foul and Rip Hamilton was charged two technicals for arguing — Carroll sank four free throws and the book was pretty much closed.
Carroll averages less than 10 points a game on the year, but in three games against Detroit he’s scored 16, 16 and 17. Did I mention he went to Notre Dame? Man, I hate this guy.
Kudos to Carlos Delfino, though, for driving hard to the basket all night long. Any questions about his post-knee-surgery hops should be laid to rest — he had a poster-worthy tomahawk jam in the fourth quarter as well as several nifty layups. Yeah, nifty. He finished with nine points in 18 minutes.
As for the point guards … let’s just say they didn’t play as well as they did Tuesday night. Flip Murray had five assists and two turnovers in 39 minutes, his defense was again suspect and his team-high 19 field-goal attempts were unwelcome. Will Blalock failed to record a single assist in 10 minutes yet still found time to take five shots. That said, I praised Blalock yesterday for being comfortable enough to shoot, so I guess it’s not fair to flip-flop on him now.
All in all, it was an ugly game. If you weren’t able to watch it, don’t waste your time, or at least skip the second quarter.
“Oh, no, it was cool for me,” Wallace said. “I ain’t got no problem with it. (Shoot) I might even ask him to do it again, you know, just to try to give us a spark off the bench and some consistency off the bench. So, no, I didn’t have no problem at all.
“I’m straight. Like I said, I might even ask him for the next game, what, tomorrow? To do it again tomorrow. Maybe that’s one of the things that we need, just try something different.”
He was joking, right? Maybe not. According to George Blaha, Rasheed is coming off the bench again tonight against the Bobcats. I touched upon Sheed’s initial benching on the FanHouse. The gist of it is this: it looks like Flip Saunders is serious about taking control of the team. Also, you know how Dale Davis missed three straight games and then only played three minutes last night? I swear I read that he was ill, but Chris McCosky revealed today that Davis has actually been in the doghouse for missing a practice.
The Pistons are 1-1 against the Bobcats (the W, the L), allowing Matt Carroll to play like a freaking All-Star both times. Hopefully Saunders lit a fire under the team and this one isn’t close.
Last but not least, I have a special request for your collective knowledge: DBB reader (and current MSU student) Mike is working on a school project about the original Bad Boys. I’ll let him take it from here:
What’s up guys, I’m doing a project at Michigan State on the original Bad Boys of the great late 80’s and I am trying to figure out what were the main songs/anthems that played during their domination… like player intro songs or just the overall songs in which were related to their play… besides the obvious “Final Countdown”, if you guys could help me out, I’d appreciate it! GO STONES!!!
There are very few things that I enjoy on a Monday morning.
One is my customary six cups of coffee. Another is seeing the Lions steadily improving their draft position while side-stepping total embarrassment. And definitely amongst the Pantheon is seeing Matt’s customary 4-in-the-morning “Pistons go twofor the weekend” post. Well, I’m on cup number four; the Lions still suck just enough to lose close games to good teams; but unfortunately, the Pistons’ gaudy 8-game win streak was haulted last night by those pesky Charlotte Bobcats, 97-89, negating the “two-fer” post.
Yes, Charlotte added the Pistons to their premiere pelt collection, which already includes wins over Cleveland, San Antonio, New Jersey. For a team that has only won five games on the year, they do tend to save their best for the best. How’d they do it?
The Irish Assassin
The main Bobcat weapon against the Pistons? Again, one Matt Carroll. Carroll, with 16 points last night, is now averaging 16 points on 65% shooting in two games against the Pistons (well above his season numbers of 6.7 and 48%). For good measure, the Bobcats added 18 and 17 from former first-rounders Emeka Okefor and Sean May (respectively), but it was Carroll who came to kick ass and chew bubble gum (and was almost out of gum). Carroll, after a short time learning what a microphone was and how it worked, had this to say in his public speaking debut:
“Tonight I came off screens looking to shoot the ball and the big guys set some good screens and the guard we’re getting the ball to me at the right time.”
Enthralling. (And to make matters worse, he attended Notre Dame.)
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
In addition to their heightened level of play, it seems the Bob-kitties’ level of sensitivity was kicked up a notch for last night’s matchup. From the Detroit News:
“That team (the Pistons) did not shoot-around today,” Bobcats guard Brevin Knight said. “We take notice of things like that.”
I have to admit, my first instinct after reading this quote was to poke fun at Charlotte for their hyper-sensitivity. But as a fan of the Pistons, it would be pretty hypocritical of me to do so. After all, it was the Pistons back in aught-4 who put their own spin upon the “disrespected underdog” tale, defeating the Lakers to win their third championship. And I had no problem revelling in “shock the world” tactics then. So be it.
T-I-R-E-D
As for the Pistons, Sheed continued his quest for world domination, leading Blue in points (19), boards (8), and blocks (2). Rip Hamilton, held scoreless in the first half (mainly due to foul trouble), redeemed himself with 17 points in the second half. But there wasn’t nearly enough offense to stay with the Bobcats; the Pistons shot not-quite 41% from the field and less than 24% from 3-point range (Sheed, Tay, and Chauncey combined to go 2-15 from beyond the arc) and generally looked a step slow all night.
Flip Saunders refused to blame the schedule for the loss in today’s Free Press:
“I don’t know if our tank was empty, but I know we played empty,” coach Flip Saunders said. “We didn’t play with the sense of purpose that we needed.”
That’s cool that Flip is still working on his “hardass” image, but one glance at the schedule — which includes games in Miami, Detroit, and Charlotte in four days — suggests that this loss could very well be a “schedule loss.” And if that is the case, aren’t you glad it was to the Bobcats rather than the Heat? Moving on.
The Pistons withstood the Knickerbockers’ best punch on Friday night, but they still stood at the final bell. In their eighth straight victory since starting the season 3-5, the Pistons fought a balanced offensive attack from the Knicks with hot shooting from three of their could-be All-Stars. Tayshaun Price tied a career high with 31 points (including 6-7 from three). And Rip Hamilton dropped in 26 (including a perfect 11-11 from the line). But Chauncey Billups had possibly the stat line of the night, with 22 points (on 8-9 shooting) and 16 assists. Chauncey, who was not happy with his struggles against the Heat the night before, took to punishing all eight of the Knicks’ point guards.
Meanwhile, Sheed, countered a poor shooting night (6 points, 3-12 from the floor) with 15 rebounds, 2 blocks, and 1 technical foul. Silently, Sheed has a real chance of averaging a double-double for the first time in his career, and the case can be made that he is the Pistons’ MVP this season.
Random thoughts on tonight’s game (6 PM, FSN Detroit):
Matt Carroll! The backup off-guard looked like an All-Star against the Pistons when they faced each other just over a week ago, scoring 16 points in 20 minutes. I feel silly even saying this, but the Pistons can’t let that happen again.
Emeka Okafor. Not only does he slightly resemble Taye Diggs, he’s also one of the top centers in the league. He’s not nearly as dangerous when forced out of the low post (on offense and defense), so here’s to Rasheed, Nazr and Dale pushing him out of the post.
Looking ahead? In the midst of an eight-game winning streak, here’s to hoping the Pistons don’t get caught looking past the Bobcats tonight (or the Blazers on Tuesday) to their prime time, nationally-televised matchup with the Mavericks on Thursday.
Weak kittens? Yes, the Bobcats have a ridiculous 4-12 record, but among the teams they’ve defeated are three likely playoff teams: Cleveland, San Antonio and New Jersey (with the lowly Celtics thrown in for good measure). This is without a doubt a game the Pistons should win, but this game is in Charlotte and both teams are rested, so a strong effort will be required nonetheless.
The Bobcats may still have a lousy record, but they’re a pretty fun team to watch with their core of Emeka Okafor in the middle, Gerald Wallace and Adam Morrison (who has movie star looks) at the forward spots and a pair of point guards in Raymond Felton and Brevin KnightYou may remember, both myself as well as several DBB readers covet Knight should Charlotte put him on the block. both in the starting lineup.
Nevertheless, Charlotte lost in the clutch against Detroit, who beat them out in the fourth quarter with both their veteran guile as well as a nicely-timed infusion of energy from the bench. From the Free Press:
That’s about when the Pistons received contributions from one of their own reserves, swingman Carlos Delfino, who scored six points in less than two minutes to help the Pistons reclaim the lead.
He was an energetic force on the court, scoring mostly around the basket, including a fast-break reverse layup and a fast-break dunk.
This is the second straight game Delfino has contributed, and he’s starting to show he can handle important minutes.
“Carlos is a player that gave us great minutes, man, great minutes off the bench,” Pistons guard Chauncey Billups said. “He is aggressive, attacking the basket, slashing, doing the things that he does.
Flip Saunders had this to say about Delfino in the Detroit News:
“He finished the game and I think he’s getting confidence in himself and the guys are getting confidence in him,” Saunders said. “When he plays with that kind of energy, it gives us a lot of flexibility.”
And, just to be thorough,Come now, you didn’t really think I’d pass up on a chance to bask in DBB favorite Delfino’s day in the sun, did you? I may as well point out that Del-Phenom was featured prominently in MLive’s headline, which proclaimed: “Pistons win behind Delfino’s big fourth quarter.”
Of course, there were other highlights, including Rip Hamilton’s 26-point effort (fueled in part by a perfect 8-8 night at the line) as well as Tayshaun Prince’s 21 points, but as many of you would expect I was most excited to see Delfino receive a solid 20 minutes of action. If the team is going to give Jason Maxiell DNP after DNP, at least one of the young players is getting some burn.
Both the Wizards and Pistons were playing their fourth game in five days, but the Pistons had the added disadvantage of playing on the road. No matter: they still found the energy to win a shootout. Of course, this game wasn’t quite as close as the score suggests.
You know how when a team is losing big in the final minute they just keep chucking three-pointers when they have the ball and foul to stop the clock when they don’t? Well, that’s exactly what happened in this one, and as a result the two teams combined for 25 points in the final 59 seconds!
That’s right: in the final minute the Wizards scored 15 points (one dunk, three consecutive three-pointers and a couple of jumpers, including one at the buzzer), but in doing so they also put Detroit on the line 12 times, with Rip going 1-2 and Chauncey Billups 9-10. The late action helped Chauncey pad his stats to finish with 29 points to go with five boards and seven assists.
Tayshaun had 21 points for the second consecutive night, shooting 3-4 from three-point land. He’s shooting a career-high .487 from beyond the arc on the year while averaging a career-high 2.9 three-point attempts per game — it’s gotten to the point that I expect his open looks to go in this year.
Of course, we’ve known for years that Prince is untouchable once he heats up…No, this never gets old…
For the Wizards, Gilbert Arenas had 19 in the first half but only 28 for the game, though he did contribute 10 assists. Caron Butler, a thorn in Detroit’s side the past couple of years, chipped in 25 points and eight boards. But playing four games in five nights is draining, and Detroit benefited more from a solid contribution from their bench: Washington got just 12 points out of their reserves while the Pistons had 32, including 10 from Antonio McDyess, nine from Flip Murray and seven from Carlos Delfino.
Detroit travels to Miami to face the dinged up Heat next, but they have until Thursday to get ready. It’ll be in front of a national audience on TNT, and even though Shaquille O’Neal won’t be playing, any game featuring Dwyane Wade is worth getting up for.
One more thing: remember those early-season struggles? They’re getting smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror thanks to what’s grown into a six-game winning streak. And for at least the next few days, they’ve moved back into familiar territory atop the Central Division, albeit still sharing the spot with the Cavaliers.
Why should I care about tonight’s game? The Bobcats are something of a giant-killer this season, having slayed both San Antonio (in San Antionio) and Cleveland on their way to a 3-8 record. The Pistons hope to avoid being their third .500+ victim.
Adam Morrison, huh? Laugh all you want about Morrison’s tearful exit from the NCAA tournament last year, but he’s a baller. He’s struggling with his shot thus far this season and still has that horrible haircut, but he’s broken the starting lineup and has had a few performances that justify his status as the third pick in the ‘06 draft.
Hello, my name is Emeka. Emeka Okafor came into this season far below the radar after being injured for most of the ‘05-06 season. While fellow ‘04 first rounders Dwight Howard, Kevin Martin, Andre Iguodala, et al garnered the preseason hype,I’m amazed at how many solid to very good NBA players have come out of the draft class of ‘04. Okafor returned in relative obscurity. Well, he’s on every Bobcat opponent’s mind now, putting up 19 points, 12 boards, and almost 4 blocks per game. (During one four game stretch this season, Okafor put up almost 24 points and 16 boards per game. That’s just silly.)
M fans may remember… Bernard Robinson, Jr., who was drafted by the Bobcats in the second round of the ‘04 draft and has stuck it out for this his third season. Who says Michigan basketball is irrelevant?
Bottom line. Despite my attempts to hype the Bobcats, the Pistons should dispatch with them easily. For the Pistons, tonight’s game begins a six game stretch against opponents with a combined record of 18-39. Time to make hay.
I said before that 
Tonight the Pistons take on Matt Carroll (he’s the guy on the far-right). 
Random thoughts on tonight’s game (6 PM, FSN Detroit):
Pistons spay Bobcats: 
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