FanPost

Game Recap/Notes: Game #26. Pistons 81 - Celtics 91. (14-12)

Well that was frustrating. This is frustrating. No matter how many times I remind myself that this is as brutal a stretch of schedule as any team in the NBA will play and that the Pistons have been right their in these games it is still very frustrating.

Box score.

Reggie Jackson:

Um. Not great. 2 points on 10 equivalents, going 0-9 from the field with 3 assists in just 19 minutes as he sat down the stretch of the game. On the defensive end he especially had a couple of really bad possessions that he has largely avoided so far this year, he just looked a step slow on defense. The other thing is that he got a technical foul in the first half, and I get it, he couldn't get a call, but you just can't pout like that.

The thing that made his struggles especially frustrating is that this should've been his game. It was a slow-down-grind-it-out-half-court game and that is where Jackson becomes most important for the Pistons and he just couldn't do it tonight.

Avery Bradley:

12 points on 16 shots with 1 assist. He played brilliant defense on Kyrie Irving who scored just 16 points, but obviously that is not great offensive production. I won't just repeat it over and over I suppose, the entire starting lineup was mostly hot garbage on offense. They looked out of sorts and just could not create good looks and struggled to hit the ones they did get and Bradley was no exception.

Stanley Johnson:

I'm honestly not totally sure why he only played 15 minutes unless I missed something. He scored 5 points on as many shots and generally did his thing on defense, but once again in 15 minutes he didn't have much impact on the game.

Tobias Harris:

Really the only starter who had a decent game with 19 points on 18 equivalents and 8 rebounds. That said, he struggled as much as anyone to create against the Celtic starters, and did a lot of his work while with the bench mob in his 38 minutes. Also worth noting, there are times where his defensive deficiencies really stand out and there were several of those moments in this game. That said, he still had the best game of any starter and was really the only guy on the entire team who was able to get some buckets. In fact, him and Tolliver were the only two Pistons players to have a true shooting percentage over 50% on the night, which really tells you all you need to know about how the offense was.

Andre Drummond:

Against a team who he has consistently dominated, Drummond had a bad night for the first time in several weeks. The Celtics came very prepared for him and were helped by the refs allowing even more abuse of Drummond in the paint than they usually do. In the end Drummond finished with 6 points on 8 equivalents (did go 4-6 from the line which was nice) with 15 rebounds in 31 minutes. He did still play mostly solid defense and generally looked alright, it was mostly the Celtic defense that held him in check more than bad play on his part.

Ish Smith:

He was a big part of the comeback I suppose with 11 points on 14 equivalents and 4 assists, but I honestly think it was mostly due to the Celtics playing like crap for a stretch than Ish playing really well. He had a couple of really nice plays, but this was not a game for Ish which I suppose is a credit to him that the team still did well while he was on the floor even if it was the result of the Celtics getting lazy for a bit.

Luke Kennard:

7 points on 8 shots in 24 minutes. He continues to show what the Pistons saw in him when they drafted him and he is still mostly making good on it. He also continues to mostly impress me on the defensive end by not being total hot garbage and instead mostly being ok.

Anthony Tolliver:

Really the only Piston player who legitimately had a good game. 15 points on 9 shots and 3 boards. He continues to show off his new-found ball handling abilities and it continues to be a really nice wrinkle to his game, combined with his shooting he has probably firmly tied himself up with Ish as the Pistons best bench guy.

Reggie Bullock:

Played 7 minutes to close out the game for... I honestly don't really know why exactly but I'm not ever going to complain when Bullock gets to play. He took 1 shot and hit it and didn't do a whole lot else.

Langston Galloway:

Played just 6 minutes, didn't really do anything other than miss a couple of shots.

BOBAN:

Apparently SVG decided Eric Moreland isn't worth and and tossed out Boban for a bit in the second half. Boban actually played pretty well, though it was hugely frustrating to watch the Pistons ignore him in the post on a like 4 straight possessions, still nice to see him get actual minutes in back to back games.

General:

This sucks, but the important thing now is to bounce back. The Pistons have one more tough game with Denver coming to town, but if they can win that and have a good stretch against some weak competition then this will all be fine, if they let themselves get too down or start to panic about losing close games to good teams then they could find themselves in trouble.



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