As the Pistons struggled to get consistent stops down the stretch in their Game 1 loss to the Magic, their best defensive player was mostly on the bench.
Ausar Thompson, a finalist for the NBA's Defensive Player of the Year award, played just over three minutes in the fourth quarter and 9:33 in the second half of Detroit's 112-101 loss to Orlando in the opening game of their Eastern Conference quarterfinals series.
Most of Thompson's minutes went to Daniss Jenkins, a better ball-handler who played 9:32 in the fourth and 15:09 in the second half. But Jenkins isn't near the same defender as Thompson and didn't provide much of a spark on offense, going 0-for-3 from the field in the second half and 1-for-7 overall.
"It’s one of those balancing acts that you’re trying to figure out in the moment of what you need," J.B. Bickerstaff said Tuesday. "Having more ball-handlers on the floor, being able to take Cade (Cunningham) off the ball some to kind of free him up, so you’re balancing that, and I think he was able to be aggressive in that quarter and find some success off the ball.
"But again, it’s one of those things that you’re trying figure out in the moment what the team needs now, and we know how important AT is for us. He’ll have a consistent role as always, because we know how impactful he is, especially down the stretch."
The Pistons were minus-5 with Thompson on the floor in Game 1, but plus-2 in the second half. They were minus-11 in Jenkins' minutes, and minus-9 in the second half. While their offensive performance wasn't pretty, Bickerstaff reiterated that "it starts always with us defensively."
J.B. Bickerstaff says the free throw disparity in Game 1 is proof the Pistons weren’t playing to their identity
“We weren’t ourselves defensively.” pic.twitter.com/wyCZp9I3QJ
— 97.1 The Ticket: (@971theticketxyt) April 21, 2026
"When you go back and watch the film of that, we weren’t ourselves defensively. I think a telling tale is, typically when we play them, they go to the free throw line a ton. I think it’s about 36 times a game. We went 38 (in Game 1), but they went 19. That means we weren’t playing our brand of basketball, being physical, being handsy, being aggressive, and that kind of set the tone for us."
That will be Detroit's primary focus in Game 2, which should lead to more minutes for Thompson.
