Two years ago, with the Pistons en route to a franchise-record 64 wins, the same familiar starting five trotted out to center court for an NBA-record 73 straight games. This season, only 13 games old, they’ve already had four of their five starters miss at least two games apiece.

Duck, Tayshaun Prince.

It started with Rip Hamilton sitting out the season’s first two games to attend to the birth of his son – and that on top of him missing the last two weeks of preseason after spraining his ankle on Oct. 14.

Hamilton returned for the home opener and the Pistons went with their starting five intact for the next five games – almost. In the second half of their Nov. 13 game at Portland, both Chauncey Billups and Antonio McDyess went down with injuries. Billups sat out the next two with a sort left knee and a right hip pointer, McDyess the next three with a strained left shoulder.

They were back en masse for last Wednesday’s home rout of the Knicks – almost. Rasheed Wallace made it to halftime before shutting it down with a bruised left knee suffered somewhere on the West Coast junket, then sat out the next two games.

So the Pistons have had the same starting five in fewer than half of their games – six out of 13 – and they’ve finished with all five still available in less than one-third of their games, four of 13.

Couple that with the fact they’ve played eight of their 13 games on the road and their 8-5 record suddenly looks better than pretty good.

All hands are expected on deck for their next game, Cleveland’s visit on Wednesday, but check back tomorrow. Hamilton sat out practice Monday, still suffering from the flu bug that made him questionable for each of the last two games. Wallace practiced lightly and, Flip Saunders said, should be ready for the Cavs.

No team has had the type of lineup continuity the Pistons have enjoyed for the last four or five seasons, but it becomes a little disorienting when a group of starters so accustomed to knowing each other’s every move suddenly is missing familiar parts.

“You have role players who now have to have different roles,” Saunders said. “Especially when you have young players and you’re trying to establish what their roles are, it’s tough for those guys to change in mid-streak. (Jason) Maxiell, for instance. As a starter, he’s in situations where he has to be looking to score more than we want him to, but he needs to. His main role is his energy. When he’s looking to score more, it takes away from (that).”

“We’ve been together for so long and we’ve grown to know each other so much,” said Chauncey Billups, “when one or two guys are out it throws off your rhythm a little bit. We’ve played more games over the last five years than anybody in the league. The one thing that’s always been the same is our starting five or six guys. When other guys come in and they play a different way than the guy who’s sitting, it kind of throws you off a little bit.”

The Pistons were hurt badly in Sunday’s loss to Utah by the Jazz’s trademark pick-and-roll offense with Deron Williams and Carlos Boozer at the heart of it. They might have had a better shot at mitigating the damage if their lineups hadn’t been so jumbled for so much of the season.

“We’re just trying to get our guys healthy and get back to playing with our consistency,” Saunders said. “As I told our guys, the way we’re built offensively and defensively is that all five guys have to be on the same page. When you have new guys in and they’re not on the same page or they don’t understand rotations quite as much and you have a breakdown, it becomes glaring.”

Two other injuries have also thrown a monkey wrench into plans. Rodney Stuckey, who was in line for serious backcourt minutes, has yet to play after breaking his left hand in the final preseason game; and Amir Johnson missed all but the final preseason game after suffering a serious ankle sprain four days into training camp, costing a young player expected to be a rotation mainstay valuable time.

Though Johnson has flashed his big-play potential, he’s still playing catch-up. Stuckey is due to see doctors again Thursday and could be cleared to resume full-contact practice, which might mean he would be available as early as Saturday night in Milwaukee, which would make game 15 the first to feature all 15 players available.

Assuming no one else gets hurt between now and then.