Good win tonight, but still concerned that the energy level drops on occassion within games even with the starters in there. As Dumars4e stated, the Pistons closed out the first three quarters in a listless fashion surrending big leads.

For the Raptors, Andrea Bargnani who scored 25 points vs the Pistons just 11 days ago was MIA tonight scoring 0!!! The 2nd qtr belong to Delfino, just as the third qtr belong Rip..

Rip was on fire tonight socring 39 and was 16-22 including a blistering 5-6 from downtown as Marv Albert would say and only 2-3 fron the line. To put it in perspective, Labron scored 51 tonight on 18-28 shooting, including 6/12 from beyond the arc and 9/16 FT. To go even further, Kobe scored 48 pts on 21-44 shooting, 2/8 from the three and 4-7 at the line. Granted the games by Kobe and Labron were overtime affairs but I would say that Rip has proven that he is the pure shooter of the bunch, but guess which two of the three are being mentioned as perrenial MVP candidates everyyear??

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"Once you go Barack, you never go Bak" Mario Cantone 2008

Sprocket Cap

Behind 39 points from Rip Hamilton on 73% shooting and perhaps Antonio McDyess’ best game as a Piston (9 points, 13 boards, 7 steals, 2 blocked shots, zero turnovers) the Pistons bounce back from the debacle in the Big Apple to wallop Toronto 103 to 89 at the Palace.

The Pistons start the game tentatively and it looks like a baseball game through the first four minutes with each team only putting up four. The teams trade baskets until Toronto is forced to call a timeout after two threes from Rip and a Sheed dunk just after the four minute mark. Toronto goes small and ends the quarter on a Calderon personal 6-0 run to pull within two at 20-18.

Billups open the second with his own personal 7-0 run off a three and four free throws to put the Pistons back up by eight. The Pistons go small to match up with Toronto and the game starts to slip away. The Raptors outscore the Pistons 11-2 over the next seven minutes behind three 3s and a free throw from former Piston Carlos Delfino. Rip hits his third three of the game to push the lead back to five, but back to back Pistons turnovers allow Toronto to come within one at 51-50 at the half. Delfino, playing power forward much of the time, scores 14 of Toronto’s 32 points in the second.

The third opens with the Pistons kicking butt and taking names. A Billups three and a fast break bucket force Toronto into a timeout a little over a minute in the period. Rip breaks free after the timeout (8-10 at this point) to push the lead back to ten and force Toronto’s second timeout of the half. This time when Toronto goes small the Pistons stay big and slowly begin to expand the lead, all the way to 75-57 when Toronto sends in the third string. An 8-2 Toronto run keyed by two baskets by Nesterovic and four points from Moon ends the quarter with the Pistons up by 12.

The Pistons just get stronger in the fourth, answering every Toronto push, most often by a Hamilton basket. Rip finishes with 39 points in 38 minutes on 16-22 shooting with five threes, four boards, and six assists. McDyess plays 34 minutes and Billups and Sheed 31. Prince ends the night with six points in 29 minutes. The Pistons shoot 50% for the game including 62% from three with 29 assists on 38 baskets.

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

Thanks for taking her...let her write a Lee cap too, so that we can see if you two watch the same game and get the same perspective

Great reading fellas!

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Impressive third quarter from the starters. A big difference this year is our ability to run. Hamilton who was a turnover machine on the break in the past is now very dangerous as he gets the ball upcourt.

Yes, Dice had a man-like game. I am still worried about this position for the playoffs. Dice is undersized against the Z and Varejao combo with the Cavs and not good at stopping a Le Bron drive.

What I like about Dyss's game is that as contest progresses, he can stretch the defense with his jumper. Not sure he helps out in the early going though. Our start is usually a series of jump shots....

Rip was on fire. Chauncey was good. Tay's still off. Sheed was solid.

Stuckey is hurting us defensively and w/ his turnovers. AA needs to take about 6 to 8 of those minutes Rip played. Don't know why this is so hard for Flip. Put Rip in w/ Stuckey, and Chauncey in w/ AA. Jarvis is useless. Hermann deserves his spot. And no Amir in the 1st half

Also where did Delfino go after the 1st half?

Good win, but hot shooting from Rip won this. The defense at times was very good. Still not consistent though. And props to Chauncey for discovering where the basket is. Someone must have drawn him a map.

It definately doesn't. Whenever i see Dice in the post, I'm practically yelling for a post move. Max needs to start. The concern with that is that Dice is our best rebounder. Can Max hold his own? He would be playing next to Sheed so maybe it doesn't matter.

Lpgrl,

I would love to see Maxiel get more burn early in the game. Are teams going to double him then? He is still somewhat raw and needs the experience for the playoffs. If anything, when the jump shots aren't falling or a good team gets up on our guards, Maxiel can be a different kind of option. With Dyss, it is here now it is your turn to take the jumper.

I also like Maxiel for the last 3-4 minutes of the game because in can step up and block a shot or go after a driver.

Dyss can stretch the defense at times for sure. And he can play certain bigs acceptably. But we are asking him to do too much in my opinion.

This team will go as far as Maxiel or someone else (Stuckey?) steps up into the mix.

Always fun to see a win at the Palace. But look, an 8 man rotation will lose in the playoffs, so tonight was yet another setback as far as preparation for the playoffs. Hayes, who is simply given minutes for what?, Stuckey, and Maxiell were the only subs. (Excepting 2 minutes of garbage time where everyone played.)


Rip was awesome, hitting 5 of 6 from 3 land and ending up with 39 points. A couple of those threes were setup by Stuckey drives to the basket. Billups had a good shooting night. Our bigs did a lot of work inside, setting up those easy outside shots for Rip and Billups.(20 points.)


Dyess had a particulary excellent game. His hands would not be pried off any contested rebounds, or loose balls (many that he created while denying post entry passes.) He had a career high 7 steals to go along with 13 rebounds. He only had 9 points, but most of those were the inside variety, exactly what we need from the guy.


Maxiell got several offensive rebounds for us. He looked realy good inside on one play, taking up a lot of space and then just flipping the ball up and in. And he made 4 of 4 from the line.


Stuckey did some scoring, 8 points I believe. His highlight was one drive where he did quite a bit of weaving and layed the ball in. Pretty impressive.


Hayes made one outside shot. Several of his misses were at least post up tries.


Tay hit a few shots, played good D. His highlight was a dunk off a drive in.


Delfino had a nice 2nd quarter for Toronto, as they ended up just one point behind at the half.


Even though it was an 8 man rotation, Flip did keep his bench players in for quite a while in the 1st half. Rip is the only guy who really got overplayed tonight, but he was on fire, did not play last night, and does not need to play tomorro night either. However, Afflalo being out of the rotation does not in anyway help the team. Rip might feel great about scoring all those points, but if he thinks he will not need any help in the playoffs, he is fooling himself.


I am sure a lot of people will applaud Flip for coaching a win. Never mind he got a win that won't translate into playoff success. His vision all along has been to use this exact rotation he used tonight. If he gets his way, there will be no championship this year. Everyone has the right to root for Saunders for another win.. Me, and many like minded people, would rather point out that the playoffs are coming up soon, and point out that this game got us nowhere toward the goal of winning in the playoffs.

saunders was quoted after the game stating that he and joe talked and that joe wanted to shorten the rotation for the time being to make sure stuckey the backup G minutes (at the expense of afflalo for now), so he'll be ready for playoffs. i haven't seen stuckey hurting us defensively though...i thought he's been a very solid defender, and the turnovers aren't a big deal right now. stuckey said after the game he still is a bit tentative in deciding when to attack the basket, and 2nd-guessing himself at times, but he'll get over it. and i believe that's true - the way chauncey was penetrating tonight, i thought stuckey could've killed toronto the same way.

let's give credit to chauncey and the pistons for pushing the ball up the court more, and for chauncey driving to the basket. there were a few times early they were trying to draw fouls instead of just making the basket, but they corrected themselves later. after being at the palace so many times, the pistons knew they were never in danger of losing this game, and i think that's why they relaxed a little bit at the end of each quarter after building a lead. to their credit, after the debacle near halftime, they really came out in the 3rd with a purpose. toronto is an okay basketball team, but not great. bosh is too weak for our frontline, and without bargnani playing well they have no chance in the playoffs.

oddly at the palace tonight, they sung the national anthem like 10 mins before announcing the lineups, which was pretty strange. there were quite a few raptors fans, and they started to chant "let's go raptors" in the 4th, but a sheed dunk and and-1 quickly shut them up. the family in front of us, i'm pretty sure they were from toronto (no team apparel either way) because the dad was clapping when the raps scored, and then when his kid cheered along with pistons fans he kind of made his kid stop heh.

something is definitely up with tay though. in the first 5 minutes of the game he missed an offensive rebound that was bouncing right to him, simply because he was standing still and didn't take one step to reach the ball, and then he let bosh rip a defensive rebound right out of his hands. i don't know what his problem is, but if anyone has seemingly grown complacent, i think it's tayshaun over anyone else. but i seem to remember a slump like this every year for tayshaun, and then in the playoffs he steps up. no excuse, but still.

2-0 with the maxiell jersey. he's struggling lately as well, but he still makes hustle plays and tough plays that don't always pile up on the stat sheet. he's learning to pass out of double teams and is making teams pay for putting him at the line, drawing fouls and making his FTs (over 73% in january, getting better every month).