As soon as the final horns sounded in The Knicks’ 123-112 victory on Saturday night, Pistons Forward and Tobias Harris, from Long Island, went to the team’s bench, headed down the line and offered words of encouragement to the group.
“It’s a series,” Harris reminded. “You can’t get too high. Don’t get too low.”
Three-quarters of Saturday’s game, the Pistons looked like a better team.
But it was the last and most important 12-minute frame that everything was unraveled for Detroit.
The Knicks socked the pistons in the fourth quarter on a 21-0 run, turning an 8-point deficit into a 13-point lead with 4:49 remaining.
For some teams, especially young groups like the Pistons, where three starters experience the NBA playoffs on Saturday, that type of late game collapse could potentially lower morale.
According to Harris, it’s not for pistons.
In fact, Harris said Detroit’s confidence remains “the highest ever.”
“We’re in the playoffs, and we know what time it is,” Harris said. “This group is always bounce back and make sure we are focused. Our energy levels are where we need them. So vets like me are making sure the spirit of this group is up. …We get excited and embrace this challenge.
The Pistons tasted unpleasant after the match on Saturday, but coach JB Bickerstaff thinks it would be better for his team to eventually experience that slow game explosion.
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“These are study lessons for us,” Bickerstaff said. “In that regard, we have to be honest with ourselves. We talked about pre-match experiences and this experience. Now, you can go back to the next game and how quickly can you learn from that?
“You have guys in their first playoff game, and you can understand what playoff basketball is, what closes the playoff basketball game, and how difficult it is.”
The biggest lesson of the fourth quarter is that small things like offensive rebounds, 50-50 balls, sales, etc. can be harmful in total to the team.
Overall, Harris and Bickerstaff were proud of the way the pistons remained calm despite being villains under the bright lights of Madison Square Garden.
“[The Knicks] They did what they had to do in Game 1,” Bickerstaff said. “Now we got the tape. We can go back and break it down and get better in Game 2.”
