So, that was a crazy game.
The Detroit Pistons lost in overtime tonight to Cooper Flagg and the Dallas Mavericks in a game that featured a little bit of everything. There were (wrongful) ejections, a rotation that went thirteen deep, and an 18-point Detroit comeback to take a fourth quarter lead.
Detroit couldn’t hold their lead late as Isaiah Stewart missed one of two free throws to tie the game at 110 to head to overtime.
Dallas won the first quarter, but the Pistons were able to reclaim the lead
near the halfway point of the second. Yet, that’s when things got bad.
Ausar Thompson was ejected for the first time in his career after making contact with an official. It’s hard to tell, but it looks like he slightly bumps the referee – though, this certainly didn’t look ejection worthy.
The referees followed this up with technical fouls for Cade Cunningham and JB Bickerstaff.
Dallas led by nine heading into halftime and eventually had an 18-point lead with four minutes left in the third quarter. That’s when JBB went deep into his bench rotation and got a spark from Daniss Jenkins, Marcus Sasser, Javonte Green, and Paul Reed.
Detroit even led 109-106 with a minute left in the fourth, but back-to-back Cooper Flagg buckets and an Isaiah Stewart free throw is what took the game in overtime. The Pistons just didn’t have enough of that comeback magic to overcome that extra five minutes of basketball.
To add onto the questionable Ausar ejection, Detroit shot 20 free throws while Dallas shot 36. Detroit was called for seven extra fouls and had six different players with at least three fouls in tonight’s game.
Cade Cunningham almost had a triple double, but he and Jalen Duren also combined to shoot 20-for-50 from the field for 46 total points. Detroit had a total of 122 field goal attempts but only shot 38.5% so everyone left plenty of open looks on the court. I also understand needing to go deeper into your bench after Ausar getting ejected, but do we really need to go 13-deep?
In what would’ve been a great comeback win, the Detroit Pistons are now 21-6 and will play their next game Saturday night at home against the Charlotte Hornets.
