PHOENIX – If Stan Van Gundy had to choose between a top-10 offense or a top-10 defense, he wouldn’t hesitate to make the call.
He’s got the top-10 defense so far, the Pistons sitting at No. 5 through eight games. But he knows a bottom-10 offense isn’t taking the Pistons where they expected this season to carry them. And that’s where they stand, 24th in the NBA after Wednesday’s 107-100 loss to Phoenix in which they shot 36 percent.
Before they left for their current four-game Western Conference road swing, the Pistons were fifth in defense and 17th in offense in fashioning a 4-2 record. They can survive with that type of offensive rating while Reggie Jackson recuperates from left knee tendinosis that required an Oct. 10 platelet-rich plasma injection which figures to keep him out another two to four weeks.
“Even if it stays like that all year, that’s a better blueprint than the other way around, if you just look at history,” Van Gundy said to start the trip. “We’re doing some good things offensively. We’re taking care of the ball pretty well. We’re getting points in the paint. We’re shooting a pretty high percentage, which is cutting down on people’s opportunities to run on us.”
But the offensive ranking isn’t the only number that underscores just how much the Pistons miss Jackson and how significantly his absence alters the character of their offense.
They’re taking the fewest 3-point shots of any team in the league at 19.1 per game, down from 26.2 last season, 10th in the league. Only 22 percent of their shots this season have come from the 3-point arc; last season, 30 percent of Pistons shots were triples.
“The way people are able to play our pick and rolls right now is a little bit different, so we’re not creating quite the problems on the pull-in and getting as many looks,” Van Gundy said. “We’re a little bit different team than we have been, playing a little bit different way, so it’s not a big surprise to me.”
Over their past two games, point guards Ish Smith and Beno Udrih are shooting 5 for 35. Smith is now shooting .337 overall and is 1 of 10 from the 3-point line this season. Udrih is hitting .378 overall and has taken only seven triples, though he’s made three.
“It’s tough because of the way everyone’s able to play our pick and rolls,” Van Gundy said after Wednesday’s loss to the Suns. “The screener’s guy doesn’t do anything.”
Without the threat of the outside shot to worry about, Andre Drummond’s man doesn’t have to extend his defense or leave Drummond even momentarily to provide the opening for him to roll to the rim and make himself available for a pass or get a free run at an offensive rebound.
It also prevents space for the point guards – and Tobias Harris and Marcus Morris – to slip through seams and get into the paint. Which leads to another shortcoming of the offense so far: very few free-throw attempts. In fact, the Pistons – who ranked fifth in the NBA last year with 25.5 free throws a game – are 23rd this season with 21.3 attempts despite taking 32 at Phoenix.
“Our whole shot distribution has changed a great deal,” Van Gundy said. “We’re not shooting as many threes, we’re not getting as many layups, we’re not getting as many free throws. I think it shows you how different it is without Reggie – Reggie attacking the basket. He gets to the free-throw line some. Andre gets the ball more because people have to pay more attention to Reggie on the pick and roll and then he gets fouled more. We get more at the basket and defenses have to suck in more so we get more open threes.
“So now our offense has been a lot more Marcus and Tobias, who can both shoot the three if the ball’s thrown to them. But their game offensively to create shots is primarily a pull-up jump shot, isolation-type game. So we’re shooting a lot more of those shots and a lot fewer of the others.”
It’s going to become tougher for Morris and Harris to generate scoring chances, though, as scouting reports circulate and teams see the way the Pistons are forced to play without Jackson. In the past two games, Harris is shooting 8 of 25 for and has scored 18 points; Morris is 10 of 22 and has scored 26.
They’re starting to see double teams on post-ups or when they put the ball on the floor. Van Gundy didn’t think their teammates gave them much in the way of outlet targets when they were doubled by the Clippers on Monday and spent part of Wednesday morning’s walk-through addressing it.
“We didn’t really give them the easy passes, so that’s an area where we tried to review and hopefully we’ll continue to get better at,” he said. “Because those guys are going to see a lot of double teams.”
Van Gundy never expected Smith and Udrih to make up for Jackson’s scoring void, but he also anticipates that their 5 for 35 showing on the trip represents the low extreme. Smith has turned in good games in the 4-0 start in home games, averaging 12.0 points and 7.8 assists on 43 percent shooting; Udrih has averaged 8.0 points and 4.5 assists on 50 percent shooting. If Van Gundy can get that from them in all games, the Pistons would survive Jackson’s absence quite well.
And until he comes back, they’re going to have to score in ways other than the way they did last year – and figure to do again this season when Jackson returns.
“Your offense is always going to be determined by who you have and who you’re going to,” Van Gundy said. “For us to just say we need to shoot more threes and put your head down and drive it to the basket with guys that that’s not your game, that’s not the way we’re going to play.”