Pistons Skidding
Auburn Hills, MI – After facing perhaps the most imposing stretch of games any NBA team will see this season, it’s not surprising the Indiana Pacers have lost four in a row.
What’s a bit harder to believe is the Detroit Pistons are a loss away from saying the same.
Oddsmakers from online sports book Sportsbook.com have made the Pistons –7 point spread favorites for Friday’s game against the Pacers. Current NBA Public Betting Information shows that 64% of more than 135 bets for this game have been placed on the Pacers +7.
One team’s skid will end at The Palace of Auburn Hills on Friday night, when the Pistons look to bounce back from a loss to the Eastern Conference’s worst club and notch their eighth straight win over the Pacers.
Indiana (7-14) has won just once in its last seven games to fall into last place in the Central Division, but the competition in that stretch has been stiff.
After an overtime loss to Charlotte on Nov. 28, the Pacers’ next four games were against the league’s three best teams record-wise. They began that stretch by beating the Los Angeles Lakers, but then fell to Boston twice around a loss in Cleveland.
The schedule started to soften Wednesday in Toronto, but Indiana was no match for the struggling Raptors. The Pacers shot a season-low 34.7 percent and lost 101-88.
"Right now it’s tough because everybody is trying, it’s just not clicking," said guard T.J. Ford, who had a season-low four points. "We just have to go back to the drawing board and figure out what it’s going to take."
Ford, who was 2-for-8 from the field on Wednesday, has averaged just 7.0 points and 3.0 assists in his last three games. He hasn’t scored in doubles figures in any of those contests after failing to do so just twice through his first 18 games.
Considering the Pacers have lost seven in a row to Detroit (11-9), their matchup on Friday wouldn’t seem to be a good time to end their longest losing streak since midway through last season. But the Pistons have dropped three straight for the first time since Jan. 18-21, and their most recent game was particularly ugly.
Detroit raced to a 17-point lead on Tuesday at Washington, but was outscored by 28 over the final 36 minutes to lose 107-94 to a Wizards team which entered with a 3-15 record.
"Right now, we’re a team when things are not going good, we give in to it," coach Michael Curry said. "We unravel a little bit. We lose our composure. We can’t be a team like that. We have to be mentally tough."
None of the opponents responsible for Detroit’s three-game losing streak have a winning record.
The Pistons thought trading for Allen Iverson would add some offense to a team that at times had struggled to score, but that hasn’t been the case. Iverson scored at least 23 points in five of his first seven games with Detroit, but he’s failed to score 20 in his last nine games. He’s averaging 14.8 points on 38.0 percent shooting in that stretch.
The Pistons started the season 4-0, but are 7-9 since Iverson joined the lineup. Detroit has gone five games without scoring 95 points and has failed to reach triple digits in nine of its last 11.
"It doesn’t have anything to do with one player. It has to do with all of the players," Iverson said.
The loss in Washington was the first game Rodney Stuckey had started alongside Iverson. That sent center Kwame Brown to the bench, and he didn’t even play. Stuckey had 10 points and 11 assists.
The Pacers have dropped four straight in Auburn Hills, including a 100-94 loss on Oct. 29 despite getting 33 points from Danny Granger.
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Posted: 12/12/08 12:36AM ET