Cade Cunningham walked around the back hallways at Fiserv Forum, getting his thoughts together, ready to hit the court for a game for the first time in almost two weeks. He followed his normal pregame routine and ran to the court, ahead of Monday’s matchup against the Milwaukee Bucks.
It was Cunningham’s first game since Dec. 22, when he became the first Pistons player to enter the NBA’s health and safety protocols this season. No one know at the time that it would be the start of a tough stretch for the team, with new additions to the list, seemingly every day, taking out assistant coaches and other members of the traveling staff.
The Pistons had eight players enter the protocols, and things finally took a turn over the weekend, with six of those players, including Cunningham, returning to the team for Monday’s game.
In his first game back, Cunningham notched 19 points and seven assists, including a clutch putback that helped close the door on their best win of the season, topping the defending-champion Bucks.
Just getting back to basketball was a relief for Cunningham, who played 37 minutes.
“I felt good. I was happy to be back. I’m ready to be back in the game and back with the squad,” Cunningham said. “For a second, it kind of felt like I was playing in cold weather a little bit, just how my chest was feeling getting back out there.”
Even getting the roster back piece by piece — Isaiah Stewart exited the health and safety protocols on Tuesday, but Cory Joseph remains in the protocols — the Pistons ended their 12-game skid head-to-head against the Bucks. Although they were still shorthanded, they relied on the experience of Bey, Cunningham and Josh Jackson to give them a boost.
“It felt good being out there, definitely really good to get a win,” said Jackson, who played 20 minutes in his return from protocols Monday. “I thought I was going to be a little winded out there, but I didn’t get as tired as I was expecting.”
Monitoring the playing time is going to be an ongoing challenge for coach Dwane Casey, who said he wanted to try to ease the returning players back into the rotation. Trey Lyles (34 minutes) played more out of necessity because of a lack of big men, but Killian Hayes (24 minutes), Jackson, and Saben Lee (14 minutes) were more in their normal range.
Having Stewart return potentially for Wednesday’s game in Charlotte could ease some of the minutes distribution as well.
It was a stark difference from the few games where Bey and Hamidou Diallo anchored a roster of rookies and G League promotions for a stunning win over the San Antonio Spurs on Saturday. Even though he was still in isolation, Cunningham was still watching his teammates.
“They played their tails off and we wanted to keep that momentum going,” Cunningham said. “We knew it was going to be tough. The Bucks are a great team, so we knew it wasn’t going to be easy to come in their house and win, but we believed that we could win.”
Biding their time
The Pistons were missing more than half of their playing rotation because of COVID protocols, but it was important to stay in contact with them. They remained connected through FaceTime and texting, and just checking in.
“Just kind of talking through it and the human aspect outside of basketball, just how they’re feeling,” Bey said. “Literally, not what happened, and how they can get better, just as a human aspect of being healthy. Just us talking and staying connected as a group.”
Bey’s draft mates, Hayes, Stewart and Lee, all were out, putting much of the onus on him to carry the scoring load in the interim. Bey delivered, but the daily texts and FaceTime sessions with his teammates were an escape — for him and for them — “just make sure that they don’t feel alone.”
Basketball became secondary for the Pistons in protocols, and the texts were personal check-ins for the players, but also to stay connected with the coaching staff and trainers to help keep them in balance both emotionally and physically — and there’s a significant balance in that.
“Our performance people giving them instructions on what to work on and how to work on things was huge,” Casey said. “I stayed in touch with a lot of the guys through text and made sure we checked on them. To me, at that time, their health is more important than basketball.
“Some people had their significant other sick and to me, if a guy is in protocol, his health and his family’s health is way more important than putting a hammer over their heads and making sure they’re working out.”
Casey said the team made exercise bikes available for the players to utilize to work out independently to help them maintain their cardio.
With so much downtime, the players had to find other things to do to pass the time, which led to some common pastimes, but also some different habits.
“Yeah, I’m a big movie guy. I watched a lot of movies, a lot of shows, but I finally got back to playing my video game a lot,” Jackson said. “My house is actually under renovations right now, and I just got my theater room finished. I’ve got this big video board with four 65-inch TVs that all come together in one and I just sit in there and play a game called Apex.
“I play that and UFC — those are the only two games that I really play.”
It was a similar situation for Cunningham, trying to find ways to divide the time.
“I was watching a lot of movies and I had never watched Ozark (on Netflix), so I got on Ozark,” Cunningham said. “I started playing Nintendo Switch a little bit, Super Mario Brothers. Other than that, watching basketball and all the regular stuff.”
Pistons at Hornets
► Tipoff: 7 p.m. Wednesday, Spectrum Center, Charlotte, N.C.
► TV/radio: BSD/97.1 FM
► Outlook: The Pistons (7-28) have won two straight games for the first time in 10 months. The Hornets (19-19) are one of the surprise teams in the East, climbing their way to eighth place with the emergence of Miles Bridges (Flint/Michigan State) and LaMelo Ball.
Rod.Beard@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @detnewsRodBeard