{"id":691342,"date":"2026-04-01T06:20:29","date_gmt":"2026-04-01T06:20:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/691342\/"},"modified":"2026-04-01T06:20:29","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T06:20:29","slug":"jalen-durens-monster-game-puts-him-in-charles-barkley-territory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/691342\/","title":{"rendered":"Jalen Duren’s monster game puts him in Charles Barkley territory"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cade Cunningham’s injury caused fans of the Detroit Pistons<\/a> to panic, even for just a little bit, as his collapsed lung<\/a> came at such an inopportune time. But even with Cunningham on the mend, the Pistons have remained a fierce team to face. They have leaned into their bruising and physically imposing brand of basketball, with Jalen Duren<\/a> being at the heart of their efforts.<\/p>\n

The Pistons have now won six of their past eight games (all without Cunningham), as Detroit handled their business against the Toronto Raptors on Tuesday night, 127-116. Duren was the star of the show<\/a> for the Pistons once more, recording 31 points and nine rebounds while missing just one of his 13 field-goal attempts on the night.<\/p>\n

In so doing, Duren joined a very exclusive club<\/a> of players who’ve recorded at least 30 points and nine rebounds while missing just one field-goal attempt in a single game multiple times in a single season. As per OptaSTATS on X (formerly Twitter), the Pistons star joined Charles Barkley (1988-89 season) and Dwight Howard (2006-07 season) as the only players to accomplish the feat.<\/p>\n

Duren has become one of the best big men in the NBA, and he’s doing everything in his power to keep the Pistons’ status as a powerhouse despite Cunningham’s absence.<\/p>\n

Pistons hold it down despite Cade Cunningham’s absence\"DetroitRick Osentoski-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

The Pistons have managed to hold steady even with Cunningham’s absence. Their only two losses since Cunningham suffered a collapsed lung came at the hands of the Atlanta Hawks (one of the hottest teams in the league since the All-Star break) and the Oklahoma City Thunder (reigning champion).<\/p>\n

Even their loss against the Thunder was admirable; during that game, the Pistons were missing Duren and Tobias Harris, among others, and still pushed OKC to overtime.<\/p>\n

With Cunningham out, many have been quick to name the Pistons a potential playoff pretender. But Duren is showing that that may not be the case.<\/p>\n

Cade Cunningham’s injury caused fans of the Detroit Pistons to panic, even for just a little bit, as his collapsed lung came at such an inopportune time. But even with Cunningham on the mend, the Pistons have remained a fierce team to face. They have leaned into their bruising and physically imposing brand of basketball, with Jalen Duren being at the heart of their efforts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cade Cunningham’s injury caused fans of the Detroit Pistons to panic, even for just a little bit, as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":691343,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3773],"tags":[7,296,188,3860,912,6,297],"class_list":{"0":"post-691342","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-detroit-pistons","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-detroit","10":"tag-detroit-pistons","11":"tag-detroitpistons","12":"tag-jalen-duren","13":"tag-nba","14":"tag-pistons"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116328008582156981","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/691342","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=691342"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/691342\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/691343"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=691342"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=691342"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=691342"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}