^

Yea, that Rip shot in the final 2 min was pretty bad. His shot selection has been off lately, and it seems like he's forgotten how to pass. I do like that we saw more catch-and-shoot from him today though.

Well we blew a 18 point lead due to slacking off of the defense, but still put it together the last 2 minutes to pull it out. Funny the Rockets had a 25 point lead in the third qtr over the Blazers and had to hold on to win by 4 points after the Blazers came back within 2 pts with less than a second left. So other teams have mental lapses too when challenged by bottom feeders.

Hopefully Billups isn't hurt since he suffered that knee or thigh mishap in the last minute or so. Him playing the entire second half of the games on Sunday and Monday may have been a bit much so I would probably play him sparingly in the remaining four games. Don't sit him as he needs to be sharp for the playsoffs and not rusty. I dont recomned slakig off just because we clinched. I think that was what the down fall last years collapse vs the Cavs.

The Home Court is now set for the east, but we still need to learn how to treat it as an advantage and win those remaining two home games vs Philly and the Raptors. After if we win every home game in the first three rounds, the trip to the finals is automatic.

Brian Hill does not coach a very good game. Bad defenders start for him. The Pistons took advantage. Billups had a great night, but it was on shooting over a tiny player in Nelson who let Billups have any shot he cared to take.

Rip got his. Hill is so slow Rip did not even need picks to get separation. That by the way was the best offensive game from Hill this year. Something maybe about returning to the Palace fully healthy for the first time. But he can't play D.

Turk was in there, and he can't guard Tay, but we were too busy exploiting even bigger mismatches. We were still at 60% shooting at the half. A near 60 point first half. Against little resistance.

We had a lot of practice in the NY game double teaming and rotating to cover the open guy. That practice came in handy in this game, as again Detroit played greast team D against their post up game. (Lots of teams have done the same though as Battie does not need to be guarded. Another rather bizarre choice by Hill to let teams do that to him. If he does not like Darko, then Ariza could start. Battie is an ok bench player, but he kills Orlando's offense while not being that good on D to make up for it.

Darko had an ok game. Nothing much statistically, but he was in there playing fine D on one end and drawing multiple defenders on the other-even when he did not have the ball. Orlando caught back up with Darko in. Its no coincidence. Ditto for Ariza.

Dale Davis got three medium length stints in this game. Man, he owns the territory under the basket. He is there for the rebound, always. Nobody pushes him around. He does the pushing around. On one sequence, there he was, under the basket, drawing defenders, and he hand off to JMAX for a short jumper. Maybe 5 or 6 feet out. Two times before that there he was dunking the ball. Dale is very good basketball player; good to see him get minutes, especially knowing he can build on these minutes in the next 4 games as our starters rest.

Dyess helped in the first half hitting 5 of 5 midrangers. But drew no fouls doing so. In the 2nd half, when he missed a few, it helped Orlando get back in the game. That midranger from Dyess simply does not help us unless he hits nearly all of them. He must do damage inside as much as he can to go with the outside shooting; something that we can count on the whole game. Yes, he has done that in several games of late. Just need more of it rather than him falling in love with that fall-a-way.

Tay was passive in the first half. But hey, don't call it a problem. Remember, we shot 60% or so in the first half. Nothing wrong with our offense at all.

Sheed was set up really nice for that triple by Flip Murray, who drove in from the mid right, drew defenders, and kicked out to Sheed. Just before that he had a good feed inside to Dyess for a score. Thats nice, but you need more from a backup point than a couple of plays like that. Mostly, between Hunter and Murray, what you got was outside shots from the point guards. Hunter did make one. Backup point remains our weak spot.

Webber did not do much. Orlando's perimeter defense, from its starters, is shoddy, but Howard and company can play good interior D. Other than contributing a couple of fouls, and about what, 4 points, not much else.

Its great that we won the game and can play our young guys some now. But the win does nothing to address the backup point problem. Basically, we can expect very little rest for Billups in the playoffs. We just had better hope he stays healthy and out of foul trouble. I hate seeing us vulnerable like that.

Still special to be at the Palace as we clinched the East best record. And just maybe I got a good preview tonight of the first round. I do not plan to go to any playoff games this year. Just two more game, Philly, and Toronto, to get a good look at the kids play.

Delfino played some good D, helped handle the ball, but I don't remember him even taking a shot tonight. No 2nd half action. It does irk me some that Murray did get a couple of 2nd half minutes. I still don't think its right to favor a guy who got run out of the rotation over someone who has hung in there all season.

I believe we could have done a lot better in this game if the starters had not come back into the game to end the 2nd quarter. The bench, despite its flaws, was doing well enough. We had a lead. Leave them in. The starters can win in the 2nd half. Especially with some rest.

Of note, we got a good long look at Davis and Maxiell paired up together. Most excellent. Orlando soon learned that getting to the basket was impossible. And our perimeter defenders knew it too, and could play 100% for the shot. What a combination. Flip has to have been saving this for the playoffs. He could have chose not to use it tonight when we got into foul trouble on our front line, as Mohammed was available. All I can say is I loved seeing those two play defense together. Awesome.

I hope that Flip keeps an open mind these last four or five games. If he sees something he can use from the youngsters, he should use it in the playoffs. GO PISTONS!!!!!

Looking at the boxscore, I see I failed to mention the three triples by Tay. Two of them cominng back to back almost in the 2nd half.

Hill played excellent defense when he was assigned to Chauncey in the 4th quarter and did a decent job against Rip when he wasn't in a broken field.

Along with Dooling and Ariza, he was probably the only Orlando player who wasn't a complete liability on D.

Orlando wins 105-99.......Darko has 17 points, 11 rebounds............and I don't like him..............
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Pretty close Nemo
TaS I don't know what the problem was but when Darko was starting and playing a lot, they lost. When Battie and Ariza came back they had a little more success. This team really fell on it's face as the season went on.

My comments came from two things. One, the first half of the game where Rip too easily got away from Hill. 2nd, I have watched every Orlando game this year. I know he can't play D, even without checking out the stats on that, which show he is a horrible defender. I will say Hill had pretty much the best game for the season.

The offense and Billips looked good but this was Orlando...Still, we were much sharper in the first quarter.

I liked Tay waiting at the three point line and popping them. The guy is a good shooter and we should use him more like that.

Dyss has been money in the bank.

The score was close but we weren't playing playoff D. Orlando will be hard-pressed to score 80 points against us.

As far as I can tell, CWebb has never learned that you can in fact get open even after setting a solid screen. In my experience, he rarely actually sets a pick --- he's always looking to slip it. A man of his size should be willing to throw his weight around much more on the court.

Edit: I was really hoping that he would learn to correct this mistake as a Piston, what with the fact that he's at best the #3 offensive scoring option at just about any time, and arguably the team's most consistent offensive scoring option (RIP) relies heavily on running around *actual* screens. Unfortunately I've been disappointed.

The game didn't show much except when the team is focused, they are unstoppable, but they seem to have no killer instinct to put a team away. Hopefully, we won't have that problem come playoffs.

CWebb looked bored.

Watching Jameer made realize how much Flip Jr has improved and how good CB really is.

Orlando may have the worst pg's I've ever seen. Absolutely zero hoopsIQ. No court vision. Everyone stands around waiting for the guards to shoot.

Also, BHill makes me respect LB a little bit. LB may have been a bad person, but watching Orlando, you get to see what a bad coach will do to a team.

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Good points all.

Not sure what's going on, if anything is going on, with Webber. He said in an interview before the Cavs game that he had been diagnosed with pneunomia which could certainly take some time to get over. If he is still lagging from that though, seems like sitting him down for a few games would be a better choice.

Could just be that he will never match up well with Howard (along with 99% of the league). I wonder though how many fourth quarters he watches from the bench before that pained frown turns into a pout.

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"But first, are you experienced? Or have you you ever been experienced? Well, I have."
Jimi