Kurt Szymanski: The Pistons will beat the Knicks in six games.
It’s truly shocking that the Detroit Pistons are gearing up to play playoff basketball just one season after having had the worst season in franchise history.
Luckily for the Pistons, they drew the most favorable matchup they could have asked for in the first round of the playoffs with the New York Knicks.
For starters, the Pistons have the series win over the Knicks in the regular season, winning three games while losing just one. This Knicks team has also hit a wall to end its season, losing four of its last seven games.
It’s also important to note that this Knick’s team is coached by Tom Thibodeau, who is notorious for running rotations that push his players to the absolute limit.
Take, for example, the opening game of the 2012 NBA playoffs. Thibodeau, the head coach of the Chicago Bulls at the time, left his star player, Derrick Rose, in the game with under two minutes to go, with the Bulls up by double digits.
What happens next? Rose tears his ACL. It’s one of the most grim parts of the MVP’s career as the top-seeded Bulls would lose in a seven-game series to the Philadelphia 76ers.
You would think a moment like this would shift how a coach runs their rotations, but it hasn’t. The Knicks have five players in the top 20 in minutes per game this season, with three players in the top five, according to StatMuse.
In comparison, the Pistons have just one player in the top 20 — Cade Cunningham.
Combine the Pistons’ relentless defense with the abominable rotations of Thibeodeau, and you have a recipe for the Pistons to wear the Knicks down game by game. Although the Knicks might look like the more dominant team to start this series, I’m confident the Pistons will come away as winners.
Evan Blanchard: The Pistons will lose to the Knicks in six games.
I promise I don’t intentionally go against Kurt in nearly every column.
Detractors of my opinion will point to the Pistons’ recent victory over the Knicks on April 10, a 115-106 contest at home. But I would like to bring to your attention the fact that the Knicks were missing starters OG Anunoby and Josh Hart, as well as rotation player Mitchell Robinson. The Pistons might’ve been able to contain Jalen Brunson in the matchup (15 points on 5-15 shooting), but if Hart and Anunoby are playing, that takes a lot of defensive attention off of Brunson.
I really do love this iteration of the Pistons, and I think that their physicality and three-point shooting are going to be a lot to handle for the Knicks. And yes, Cunningham could be the best player on the floor in this series. And yes, yes, yes, I have heard countless times about the Knicks’ 0-10 record against the Celtics, Thunder, and Cavaliers. Are the Pistons those teams? No. Are they nearly as talented as those teams? Big time no.
The bottom line is that the Knicks simply have too much talent to lose to this Pistons team, especially in this core of the Pistons’ first playoff push.
If I were going to predict an upset, I would lean heavily on betting that Detroit’s three-point shooting gets red hot, the Knicks keep dealing with injury issues to key players, and Cunningham takes a step even further in his ascension to NBA stardom.
But I’m not going to predict that because I’m a realist. Knicks in six. It rhymes.
