Detroit heads to Philly looking for season's first road streak

Game tips at 7:00 p.m. EST
Philadelphia 76ers: 11-9 (7-5 home)
Detroit Pistons: 7-15 (2-10 road)

Detroit Pistons tickets

The Situation

Don't let the records fool you. This should be a very even matchup, perhaps even favoring the Pistons.

The Sixers offense does some good things. Turner and Holiday have developed into a formidable playmaking duo, and the team is very stingy in turning the ball over. But what they haven't figured out yet is how to get the ball into the hoop. They're toward the bottom of the league in points and field goal percentage as a team, and no one on the team is able to provide a TS% better than 55%. By comparison, the Pistons have 3 players above that mark, Singler, Drummond, and Knight.

Despite their far superior record, Philadelphia has not played much better than Detroit early on this season with the teams near identical in their point differential.

Detroit looks to continue strong play from unlikely sources considering their slow start to the season: Knight and Stuckey. Don't look now, but over his last 10 games Knight is averaging 18.4 ppg on a shooting line of 47%/49%/84%. Meanwhile Stuckey has boosted his scoring over the past 8 games, but has been even more impressive at the point guardy stuff: 5.6 assists per game in 28 mpg opposite only 1.3 turnovers per game.

Despite Knight's strong play scoring, his distribution performance has fallen off putting up a negative a/to ratio - which is something that's often been the case in his young career, struggling to combine both elements of his game. In Cleveland on Saturday night, when the two played together Stuckey was the one initiating the offense with Knight playing off the ball.

Keys to the Game

Get Moose going: Greg Monroe's officially in a slump. Philly boasts a weak defensive front line, one in which Moose put up 19/18/6 against in their first meeting. This matchup presents a great opportunity for a bounce-back.

Singler versus Turner: The teams' first meeting was the start of the Singler into the starting lineup experiment, and the rookie harassed Turner to 3 points on 1-6 shooting. If Singler takes him out of the game again tonight, the Sixers have little chance to win.

Bull Moose Party: COPY, PASTE.

Question of the game

Is a changing in the roles between Stuckey and Knight underway?