TAKE FIVE
A five-point dissection of the Pistons’ improbable win

1. A TALE OF TWO HALVES – Anyone watching the Pistons-Nuggets game with the goal of reaching a final verdict on the Chauncey Billups-Allen Iverson trade would have left the Pepsi Center at halftime with the decision reached.

Oops.

In the first meeting of Detroit and Denver since their Nov. 3 trade sent shock waves through the NBA, Billups scored 20 first-half points while Iverson shot 1 of 8 and scored three points as the Nuggets took control and appeared headed for an easy win.

But Iverson was just as brilliant in the second half, scoring 20 of his own after halftime, and the Pistons came from 10 points back in the fourth quarter to win a crazy 93-90 decision that ended with Billups missing a tying 3-pointer at the buzzer.

“I knew I was struggling, but one thing I’ve learned in my long career is that if you stay with it, stay with it, something positive will happen in the end,” Iverson said. “It’s a good feeling, just for the fact we got so many guys that are out, and even the guys playing are playing hurt. All of us are banged up and we come in here in a hostile environment and pull one out. It makes us feel good, makes us feel like we have a team.”

With Rip Hamilton missing his seventh straight game, Rasheed Wallace his fourth straight and Rodney Stuckey – Billups’ successor at point guard – out of the game with back stiffness when the Pistons rallied, Detroit broke Denver’s five-game winning streak and handed the Nuggets, playing without the injured Carmelo Anthony, their first loss in 20 games this season when they led going into the fourth quarter.

It was all improbable enough to make the Pistons feel they might even have a shot to win at Utah, which has beaten them seven straight times, as they close out their four-game West Coast road trip Saturday night.

Arron Afflalo hit six free throws in the final 10 seconds to hold off Denver, which had a chance to tie with five seconds remaining when Iverson tried to foul J.R. Smith before he got a shot off, but Smith launched a hurried 3-pointer from 30 feet and got the call. Smith, though, missed the first free throw before making the final two.

“I don’t think I will be able to sleep tonight,” Iverson said. “I told my teammates that once we got to Utah they would have to board up my windows and take all the sheets out of my room because I would kill myself if we lost this game being that I gave J.R. those three shots.”

“I thought we stuck to the game plan the entire game,” Michael Curry said. “We wanted to control the tempo of the game, keep the game to under 100. We felt that if we kept it in the 80s or 90s that would favor our side.”

Iverson scored three fourth-quarter baskets on layups that broke down Denver’s defense and drained a triple, but he also set up other baskets – a Jason Maxiell dunk, a wide-open Tayshaun Prince triple – with other tremendous penetrations that got Denver’s defense on the move.

The Pistons finally took the lead with 20 seconds left when Prince scored on a 10-foot driving half-hook across the lane. Iverson then forced a turnover by swatting the ball away from Smith on a drive with 10 seconds left to set up the free-throw shooting contest that ensued.

Iverson’s 23 led the Pistons, who got 19 from Prince and 17 from Afflalo. Billups wound up with 30 for the Nuggets.

“That is all fun at the start, but at some point it becomes a game and you just try to win the best you can,” Billups said. “It was a little strange. There were a couple times in the third quarter when I kept looking up at the clock, we were actually up and I kept for some reason thinking we were down because I kept looking at the Pistons’ (score). It was just kind of weird.”

TEAM COLORS
The story of the game in Pistons red, white and blue

2. – If Billups had dared to dream what his first game against his former team might have been like, he probably wouldn’t have been bold enough to dream he’d drop 20 points on them by halftime.

It was classic mix of Billups’ greatest hits, knocking down perimeter jump shots, using the threat of his outside shot to pump fake defenders off their feet to get past them or draw fouls, posting up when smaller defenders like Iverson or Will Bynum found their way to him.

He kept pouring it on after halftime, suckering Stuckey into fouling him while shooting a 3-pointer – he made all three free throws, naturally – and drained a momentum-stalling 3-pointer after the Pistons closed within four points midway through the third quarter.

But Iverson, suddenly, became unguardable in the second half, slicing up Denver’s defense repeatedly.

“You get down as much as we did – we got down 13 points – and we just kept fighting and believing in ourselves,” Iverson said. “At halftime, we were like 4 for 11 from the free-throw line and I was like 1 for 8 from the field. Nothing was going right for us and we were only down 10 points and we just stayed with each other and kept fighting. We tried to get it close, we got it close and we were able to climb the mountain and get the game.”

“For three-fourths of his minutes, we did our job against him,” Nuggets coach George Karl said. “He is just a great little player. There will never be another guy who scores like him for a person his size. He is amazing. I think we were all hoping that AI would have a great game and lose.”

3. BLUE COLLAR – Prince wasn’t quite as sharp offensively as he was in his 26-point outing at Portland, but he was good enough on the offensive end and was excellent when it mattered most, continuing the roll that has seen him average 19 points and eight rebounds over the last eight games.

He hit a triple to get the Pistons within three with a little more than three minutes left and hit the shot with 20 seconds to go that gave the Pistons their first lead of the game. He finished with six rebounds and four assists plus his 19 points in another iron-man effort, playing 42 minutes.

With Stuckey out, he again became the de facto point guard late in the game, and his defense was stifling on Linas Kleiza, who scored 21 in his first start for the injured Anthony but was held without a basket by Prince. Kleiza finished with one point, going 0 for 6, in 34 minutes.

And down the stretch, with Kleiza out of the game for his ineffectiveness, Prince guarded Billups.

4. RED FLAG – Free throw shooting hurt the Pistons for the second straight game – except for Afflalo’s 8 for 8 performance.

After going just 9 of 16 in the one-point loss at Portland, the Pistons missed their first four against Denver, and for as badly as they played in the first half, they could have been much closer than 10 if they hadn’t missed seven of their 13 first-half foul shots.

Three different Pistons went to the line and missed both shots over the course of the game – Kwame Brown, Jason Maxiell and Stuckey.

They wound up a respectable 27 of 40 thanks to Afflalo’s six makes in the final 10 seconds with the game on the line. Iverson and Afflalo were a combined 17 of 19. The rest of the team was 10 of 21. Ouch.

“To have guys down and pull out key roles, it’s always a good thing,” Afflalo said. “I started making those first ones and I was feeling comfortable.”

THE LAST CALL
A little perspective on a memorable win

5. TRIP SAVER – What’s that win worth? It was the most unlikely win the Pistons have had all season, dwarfing their road win over the Lakers when they were unbeaten and winning by 15 points a game.

Effectively down three starters and trailing by double digits in the fourth quarter, the Pistons had no reason to think they had a comeback in them.

So they didn’t think – they just played. Hard. Afflalo hounded J.R. Smith. Iverson attacked the basket as if he were 23 again. Antonio McDyess kept chasing down rebounds, another remarkable 12 boards in 23 minutes. Prince kept doing anything the Pistons needed him to do – guard point guards, play point guard, hit 3-pointers, rebound.

The Pistons have played three straight games that came down to a final shot in the final second on this grueling road trip now and are 2-1 for their trouble. When the schedule came out before the season, this was a trip that made you think if they could split their four games, they’d be OK.

Now, heading into another thankless task at Utah, they’ve already achieved the split – despite their injury woes.

On a night that already had the intriguing backdrop of the Billups-Iverson trade, the Pistons came away with a win that will serve them well on many levels going forward.