Detroit News

Kyle Hightower  |  Associated Press Boston — Brad Stevens says he wasn’t close to leaving the Boston Celtics for the coaching job at Indiana University. In fact, he says he never received an offer. “I was never offered a package. That’s all news to me. Secondly, I wasn’t going to leave anyways,” Stevens said before

Detroit — When a team jumps to a lead of 20-plus points in the first quarter, it very often feels too good to be true. When it’s a young lineup, a lead that big feels even more fragile. And so it was on Monday night, when the Pistons bulldozed their way to a 23-point lead

You can win for losing. It’s just not as easy as it looks in the NBA, where the race to the bottom isn’t quite the mad dash that it once was but still takes a special kind of fortitude. And to their credit, it’s one that these up-and-coming Pistons don’t seem to have, something they

A funny thing happened on the way to winding down the Pistons’ season. The fans got excited about something. It wasn’t about a buzzer-beating win or a standout individual performance against an elite-level team. Instead, it was just the notion that the Pistons started all three of their first-round picks in the game against the

Detroit — Pistons rookie Saddiq Bey is used to not being in the spotlight. It’s not a position that he naturally gravitates toward, but with the season he’s having, he may not be able to stay in the background for much longer. Even among the Pistons’ three first-round draft picks last year, Bey was the last taken.

Isaiah Stewart had a career-high 21 rebounds in Friday’s win over the Oklahoma City Thunder. He followed it up with another career-high performance in the back-to-back against the Washington Wizards. Stewart was one of their best offensive options, in the paint and even beyond the arc, with a season-best 19 points, on 7-of-11 shooting, and

Detroit — Three rookies, a second-year player and a fourth-year player. That’s a hard lean to the youth movement for the Pistons’ starting lineup in Friday night’s 110-104 win over the Oklahoma City Thunder. The Pistons (17-39) have committed to the young players, with the playoffs all but out of their grasp. Killian Hayes had

Detroit —  After letting a victory slip away in the final minute on Wednesday against the Los Angeles Clippers, the Pistons didn’t let another one get away. With a revamped starting lineup tilted toward the youth movement, along with several veterans who were resting or injured, the Pistons put a rotation on the floor that accentuated

Tim Reynolds |  Associated Press The NBA said Thursday that the rate of players needing to miss games because of injuries is down from last season, and within the normal range for what the league has seen over the last five seasons. League data shows the player injury rate this season is down about 6%, even

Detroit — The Pistons had one of their better games this season in Sunday’s loss to the Los Angeles Clippers. They played one of the top teams in the Western Conference down to the final minutes of the fourth quarter, before the Clippers pulled away. The rematch on Wednesday was just as good. The result was

Lansing — The leaders of many of Michigan’s largest companies are opposing more restrictive voting laws, posing a possible obstacle to the plans of the state’s Republican lawmakers.  Leaders of more than three dozen major Michigan-based companies — including the Detroit Three automakers, mortgage lending giant Rocket Cos. and all four of Detroit’s professional sports teams — released a joint statement

So much has been made about the Pistons’ youth movement and young core, that it’s often overlooked that they have some good veterans around them too. It’s not just Jerami Grant, Wayne Ellington and Rodney McGruder. Count Cory Joseph among them. Joseph, 29, arrived in the trade that sent Delon Wright to the Sacramento Kings

Pat Graham  |  Associated Press Denver — The Denver Nuggets will be without Jamal Murray indefinitely after the dynamic point guard suffered a torn ACL in his left knee. The Nuggets announced the diagnosis in a statement Tuesday. It’s a big blow to a team coming off a season in which it advanced to the Western Conference

Ben Ross  |  Associated Press San Francisco — Stephen Curry passed Wilt Chamberlain for the most points in Warriors franchise history Monday night in Golden State’s game against the Denver Nuggets. Curry scored 21 points in the first quarter, giving him 17,786 in his career. That passes Chamberlain’s 17,783 with the franchise, a record he’d held

By Dave Campbell  |  Associated Press Minneapolis — In the raw aftermath of another killing of a Black man by police in Minnesota, there was no place for pro sports in the Twin Cities on Monday. The Minnesota Twins, Wild and Timberwolves all postponed their games a day after the shooting of 20-year-old Daunte Wright following a

Many of the top teams contending for the NBA title have a roster stocked with former Pistons players. The defending-champion Los Angeles Lakers have a few and the Brooklyn Nets have a couple. The Los Angeles Clippers have three former Pistons, and the schedule presents consecutives games between the two teams. Reggie Jackson, Luke Kennard

For the end of a long road trip, the Pistons’ effort against the Los Angeles Clippers on Sunday night is to be commended. A loss is still a loss, but some losses can provide lessons that can help a team improve later this year or even into next year. It seems that the Pistons are

At the end of a week-long western road trip, there’s almost an expectation that the Pistons would let down. Increasing the degree of difficulty was that it was the second game of a back-to-back, against one of the best teams in the Western Conference, and without their best players. The Pistons didn’t just stay with the

There’s something to be said for the Pistons in the MOET Index. It’s not some complicated advanced-statistics formula to break down a player’s value in comparison to others around the league. It’s just a simple “My Own Eye Test” gauge that doesn’t rely on statistics, but just what’s apparent by watching the game. For most

To some degree, the Pistons’ western road trip already is a success, with two victories, over the Oklahoma City Thunder and Sacramento Kings. One more win would give them a winning record in a difficult stretch of games. It didn’t come against the Portland Trail Blazers. Enes Kanter had a historic night and as usual,