7 Key Pistons Games to Watch For This Season
The NBA released it's 2016-2017 schedule today, which can be a very exciting time for basketball nuts, like me, who have been craving any NBA news in the past month or so. The Pistons are coming off their best season in years, and are hoping that their playoff berth propels them into this season. Here are 7 key games to watch out for:
October 26 @ Toronto – THE OPENER. Detroit Basketball is back and the Pistons have something to prove this season, why not start with last season's 2nd best team in the east? I hope a contingent of Pistons fans travel to the Air Canada Center for this one. #WeTheD
November 7 @ Clippers – The first of a 4 game west coast road trip early in the season against the very competitive Clippers. If the Pistons can take care of this one, they'll have some momentum to carry us through the road trip.
November 14 vs OKC - Reggie Jackson vs Russel Westbrook was a thing, a pretty intense thing, but now it’s more than that. It's too bad Kevin Durant ran away because it would've been nice to see him back up his comments on the Thunder, but such is life. Russel had this to say after Reggie's late game celebration last season - "Honestly, I think it's some real bullshit. I don't appreciate it from our team and our organization. I don't like it all. But it is what it is. We'll see him down the line. We'll take care of that when we get there." We'll see how this one plays out.
November 17 vs Celtics - The Celtics won 4 more games than the Pistons last season, and somehow to everyone else it put them light years ahead of us. The addition of Al Horford is nice, but I disagree with the projections of the Celtics being on a whole nother level than the Pistons. I can see the Pistons-Celtics rivalry becoming a thing again this season.
November 18 @ Cavs - The defending champs who handed the Pistons a nice broom in the playoffs this past season. As we learned last year, a regular season record of 3-1 against the Cavs doesn't necessarily translate into the playoffs, but I expect the Pistons to come out with a lot of fire this game. It would be nice to get one early against the defending champs.
Dec 17 vs Pacers - Our first game against the retooled, really intriguing Pacers. I expect us to be fighting for a relatively high playoff berth with them at the end of the season, but for now, we have a rivalry to watch. In case you forgot, Paul George and Marcus Morris got into it a little bit at the end of a January Pacers win. The games after that were a bit chippy, and I expect the rivalry to pick up again now that both teams are competitive again.
Dec vs 23 Warriors - Welcome back to the Palace, Kevin Durant. Not much to say about this one, but last year it went well on Ben Wallace night against the 73-9 Warriors. The Pistons always seem to show up when we play what's supposed to be a superior opponent. Expect nothing different here.
