A 117-105 victory over the Toronto Raptors on Friday, the Detroit Pistons won the playoff spot a year after winning the NBA-low 14 games. Detroit was actually one of the best singleseason turnarounds in league history, as it was the first team to triple their winning totals from the previous year.
The 14 victories from 2023-24 are also the lowest total for teams that made the playoffs the following season.
The Pistons currently technically own the No. 5 seed in East, but that’s because they played one game over the six-seed dollar. Detroit and Milwaukee are tied to loss columns, and Milwaukee took the tiebreaker on a direct 2-0 record today.
But… the Pistons and Bucks conclude the season with two games in a row with each other. These two games are very likely to determine the seed for No. 5 and No. 6, so both teams could catch No. 5 pacer.
“To be honest, it’s hard to frame emotions right now,” Jalen Duren, a big-time third-year student, said of the playoff spot. “This is a testament to all the efforts we have put in since day one. But we are not finished yet. There is nothing we are satisfied with. We will continue, continue to grow, and continue to accumulate.”
Detroit won again on Friday without All-NBA point guard Cade Cunningham. Cunningham has been out on calf contempt since March 21st, with the Pistons winning four of six in the span.
But they mixed in and got a 133-122 victory over the full-strength Cavaliers. Without him, the game further drove the point that the Pistons were an honest threat to win the first round series.
Even if they fell to No. 6 and played the Knicks, they can give New York a real problem – they are not preferred to win. When it comes to a 4-5 matchup with Indiana, Indiana is one of the few teams that have surpassed Detroit since the All-Star break.
However, Piston has been cooking for a while. Since January 1, they have owned the league’s third-best defensive rating and the fifth-best net rating, with the offense just outside the top 10 being the engine, but the pistons are equipped with quality veterinarians such as Tobias Harris, Malik Beasley and Tim Hardaway Jr.
If you’re going to beat a piston, you’re going to get it. They play hard. They defend like crazy, and there are playoff markers throughout this team as Cunningham’s relentless driving is the source of consistent offensive creation. Now they sealed out the top six spots to prove it.
