Detroit Pistons: How A Shoddy Bench Doomed The Pistons In Game 2
By Kyle Baranko
In the end, it was the bench of the Detroit Pistons that let them down in Game 2 against an angry LeBron James and Cleveland Cavaliers
Sometimes you just don’t have enough quality NBA players to round out a playoff-caliber roster. The Detroit Pistons have some very solid and balanced lineups but just cannot find ways to plug the gaps during those deceptively essential stretches of the game at the close and start of quarters.
Twice, Stan Van Gundy was forced to send some poor second unit souls to LeBron James‘ slaughterhouse at key moments in their Game 2 loss. The Cavs’ superior talent, depth, and some record-tying hot shooting completely demolished Van Gundy’s patchy bench, especially in the second half.
The Detroit Pistons starting five was engaged and ready to fight from the outset. The Cavs stayed competitive behind some insanely hot shooting from Kyrie Irving and J.R. Smith, but otherwise, it looked like Detroit was squarely in control.
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The devastating lineup with Kevin Love at the 5 that all but torched Drummond in Game 1 was largely stymied the second time around by Van Gundy’s tactical maneuvering and increased effort on Drummond’s part. He had clearly watched his film and looked more comfortable stepping up to contain Love’s threes.
Plus, Van Gundy made sure he went at Love on the other end. Every opportunity they had, Drummond posted up Love or ran him through the pick and role with Reggie Jackson. The strategy worked nicely. Drummond and Reggie Jackson led the way with 15 and 12 points in the first half, respectively, and kept them close during a key stretch to close the 2nd period.
But the Cavs had two advantages that nearly blew open the game.
First, LeBron plays a beastly number of minutes. His rest of about three minutes came near the end of the first as the Cavs rode Irving and J.R.’s hot shooting – only to return for the start of the second quarter to feast on poor Steve Blake, Reggie Bullock, and Anthony Tolliver.
The only other bench player to get significant time, rookie Stanley Johnson, performed admirably and decently well. But for some reason, the young guy’s mental toughness and stout defense seemed to anger LeBron. And angry LeBron is scary. He led the Cavs on a huge run that was only quelled by the return of Detroit’s starters at around the 7-minute mark of the second quarter.
When Detroit’s mediocre bench unit trotted out to contain the Cavs at the end of the third, the game blew open. LeBron and Irving are some of the fastest playmakers in the NBA and simply ran the opposition off the court. All Pistons on the floor were clearly flummoxed and committed some morale-killing turnovers.
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Once LeBron tasted blood, he riled up the rest of his team and sped up the pace drastically to take advantage of the panic-stricken Detroit bench; and once the pace increased, so did the rain of threes and rate of dunks. If there’s one axiom any modern NBA analyst can agree on, it’s that the more talented team almost always has the advantage in a high-speed game (that’s why the Warriors always play so fast).
Van Gundy can take away some positives from this blowout. His team was mentally tough. Reggie Jackson and Marcus Morris have so much confidence in themselves that it’s almost embarrassing to watch – until you realize it helps them perform better.
Johnson also seems to have immense confidence in his game and is clearly not afraid of LeBron, which unfortunately pissed him off and s him perform better this time. But still – the energy permeates Detroit’s top 6 contributors and at least gives them a chance.
The X’s and O’s don’t look too bad either. Van Gundy has appeared to figure out Cleveland’s suddenly scary lineup with Love at the 5. It also must be nice knowing that the Cavs were unusually hot from three. It’s true that the Cavs are a great shooting team and always shoot a high volume of threes. But they canned 20 on a scorching but unsustainable 53 percent rate, which tied the record for most team 3-pointers in a playoff game.
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This loss may be discouraging, but it does have silver linings. If Van Gundy can somehow figure out the issue with his bench, expect the Pistons to put up a fight when the series heads back to Detroit.