Entering Saturday\u2019s game in Detroit, Brooklyn had lost 10 straight games. The Nets appeared to be on their way to an 11th straight defeat early in third quarter, when they trailed by 23 points.<\/p>\n
Instead, the top-seeded Pistons stunningly dropped their third consecutive contest on the front end of a home-road back-to-back, writes Hunter Patterson of The Athletic<\/a>. Detroit will play at Miami on Sunday.<\/p>\n \u201cOur level of respect for the game,\u201d head coach J.B. Bickerstaff said when asked what changed for his team down the stretch. \u201c(During) the second half, we built a 20-point lead, and then we stopped respecting the game. You disrespect the game, and it\u2019s going to bite you in the ass. That\u2019s what happened to us.\u201d<\/p>\n Bickerstaff was again frustrated with the team\u2019s effort level<\/a>, particularly on the defensive end, saying the team went away from its identity. Backup center Isaiah Stewart<\/a> echoed that sentiment, Patterson notes.<\/p>\n \u201cEveryone in this locker room felt this was a must-win game,\u201d Stewart said. \u201cAll of us, as men, have to look ourselves in the mirror. \u2026 We know we didn\u2019t play up to our standards for 48 (minutes) tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n We have more from around the Eastern Conference:<\/p>\n Trae Young<\/a> was anxious ahead of Wizards debut on Thursday, but his presence brought a level of excitement to the home fans that has been \u201clargely absent\u201d in 2025\/26, per Josh Robbins of The Athletic<\/a>. Young didn\u2019t let his pre-game jitters impact his play on the court, as he scored on the team\u2019s first possession. The four-time All-Star point guard finished with 12 points, six assists, two rebounds, two steals, and was plus-four in 19 minutes in his first game in over two months. \u201cGoing to a new city and a new place, I\u2019m telling you I\u2019m living in the moment,\u201d Young said afterward. \u201cI\u2019m just so joyful, happy that I\u2019m here in this situation, this city, and I just look forward to having some great moments here. It\u2019s all about what we do on the court.\u201d
\nWizards forward\/center Julian Reese<\/a> delivered an impressive performance on Thursday in his third career game. As Robbins writes for The Athletic<\/a>, the 22-year-old scored 18 points and pulled down 20 rebounds, with the latter being the single-game high for rookies this season. \u201cBeing thrown into the fire like he has (been) this last week, it\u2019s been great to see,\u201d Young said. \u201cThis being his third game and having this type of night, I know he\u2019s excited and he\u2019s happy. But his teammates are just as excited and happy for him as well. Hopefully, he has more of these nights in the future, for sure.\u201d
\nIn a mailbag for The Athletic, Eric Koreen<\/a> answers several big-picture questions about the Raptors. Koreen expects Toronto to be aggressive in search for roster upgrades this summer, and writes that while Scottie Barnes<\/a> has developed into one of the best defensive players in the league, his offensive limitations make him a tricky player to build around.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Entering Saturday\u2019s game in Detroit, Brooklyn had lost 10 straight games. The Nets appeared to be on their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":647584,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3773],"tags":[7,296,188,3860,1016,1648,18348,6,297,1261,494],"class_list":["post-647583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-detroit-pistons","tag-basketball","tag-detroit","tag-detroit-pistons","tag-detroitpistons","tag-isaiah-stewart","tag-j-b-bickerstaff","tag-julian-reese","tag-nba","tag-pistons","tag-scottie-barnes","tag-trae-young"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116195050073273437","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647583","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=647583"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647583\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/647584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=647583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=647583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=647583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}