J.B. Bickerstaff wasn’t trying to make an excuse for why his Detroit Pistons had been blown out at dwelling by the Philadelphia 76ers. As a substitute, Bickerstaff supplied a motive why the Pistons had been off their sport.
“Our guys had been exhausted. We sat on the runway final night time till 2:30, 3 am, bought dwelling round 4:30 in a snowstorm,” Bickerstaff mentioned. “We simply didn’t have it tonight and that’s honest. Right now was only a tough day for them.”
Detroit performed on Friday in Indiana. As a result of climate within the space, the Pistons takeoff from Indianapolis was delayed. They then performed Saturday at dwelling towards a Sixers crew that hadn’t performed since Wednesday. As well as, Cade Cunningham was a late scratch for Detroit attributable to hip soreness.
Bickerstaff additionally urged that the NBA take a look at avoiding back-to-back video games when a crew is coming off an NBA Cup sport. Many coaches have mentioned that groups are going tougher within the cup video games, even in blowouts, as level differential is a crucial tiebreaker. The NBA avoids scheduling NBA Cup video games because the second leg of a back-to-back however has no restrictions for a back-to-back sport following a Cup sport.
