A dream season came to a crushing end Thursday night for the Pistons. After blitzing the Knicks in the fourth quarter to take a lead and whip Little Caesars Arena into a frenzy, the Pistons were outscored 11-1 down the stretch and bounced in six games of their first-round playoff series.
Jalen Brunson, booed and taunted for all three games in Detroit, hit a step-back game-winning three with five seconds to play to lift the Knicks to a 116-113 win. The Pistons had a chance at a game-tying look in the dying seconds, but Malik Beasley couldn't handle a pass from Cade Cunningham that slipped through his hands and wound up in the crowd.
"Had an opportunity to tie the game," said Beasley. "Mad about that. Sucks, but hell of a year."
Brunson scored eight of his 40 points in the final 2:23, while Cunningham was held scoreless for the final five-plus minutes. The Pistons erased double-digit leads for the Knicks in both the second and fourth quarters, ripping off a 13-0 run to build a seven-point lead with 2:35 to go, but Brunson and the Knicks delivered the final blow.
Another tight, tense finish was a fitting end to a series in which almost every game was decided in the dying moments.
"Nothing the Knicks did came easy," said J.B. Bickerstaff. "They had to earn it all, and tonight they just made one more play than us down the stretch."
While they took the loss, the Pistons did themselves proud. They rose from the ashes of the worst season in franchise history to win their first playoff game since 2008, give a 50-win team all it could handle in the first round and reinvigorate a fanbase that roared in approval over the course of three playoff games in Detroit.
But none of that eased the sting of the defeat Thursday night, and the reality that the season is over.
"There's no words for the loss," said Bickerstaff. "It's one thing when you're bad and you know the season's coming to an end, but when you've just laid it all on the line, there's nothing but disappointment in that moment. And that's what our guys are feeling right now -- the lack of an opportunity to come together again and accomplish something, which has what driven us all year."
Still, Bickerstaff acknowledged that after watching his players "revitalize the fanbase the way they did, you can't ask for anything more than that."
"We're disappointed because we thought we had more to give," he said, "but immensely proud of these guys for everything that they've accomplished."
