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Another night, another dominant outing from Jalen Duren and the Detroit Pistons.
Aside from an Indiana Pacers fourth-quarter run the Pistons quickly combated, Detroit was in the driver’s seat throughout Monday night’s 127-112 home victory. It’s what good teams tend to do against the league’s bottom feeders.
A left hip contusion sidelined Cade Cunningham for the third consecutive game, and Ausar Thompson missed his fourth straight with a right ankle sprain. Nonetheless, the depleted Pistons (12-2) roster showed once again why depth is its most valuable asset during the team’s 10th straight victory, the franchise’s longest win streak since 2008.
Duren, who turns 22 on Tuesday, notched his fifth-straight double-double with a game-high 31 points on 12-of-13 shooting, 15 rebounds and three assists. According to the team, Duren became the first player with at least 30 points and 15 rebounds on 92 percent shooting since Hall of Famer Dwight Howard did so in 2010.
Duren has been leaning further and further into his expanded offensive role, which has undoubtedly raised the Pistons’ ceiling. He mixed in multiple grab-and-go pull-up jumpers with his usual rim-running dunks. If he can make his midrange game a mainstay, Duren could join Cunningham as an All-Star.
Detroit continued its upward trajectory and seemingly has no plans of cooling off. Aside from Duren’s dominance, the balance and depth of the roster, and the camaraderie the players have established under J.B. Bickerstaff, what exactly has been at the core of these Pistons performances during the streak?
“Our defense. That’s the most important thing for us,” Bickerstaff said. “When we commit to the defensive end of the floor, it triggers everything we do offensively. We feel like we’re an elite transition basketball team. So when we’re getting stops, it gives our guys an opportunity to get out and create early opportunities.”
The Pistons limited the Pacers to 41.7 percent from the field and 29 percent from 3-point range. Detroit’s 109.5 defensive rating trails only the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder. Isaiah Stewart anchored the defense Monday, as he has all season, with five blocks — which tied his career high.
Meanwhile, Daniss Jenkins continued to stake his claim as the full-time backup point guard once Cunningham returns to the lineup, finishing with a career-high 26 points and eight assists. He’s become a steadying force for Detroit in Cunningham’s absence, thanks to an innate ability to control the game.
Jenkins is averaging 21.8 points, 7.8 assists, 4.3 rebounds and two steals on 49/48/88 shooting splits over his last four games.
“He makes our jobs as coaches easier,” Bickerstaff said. “He understands the game as a whole. He can find the sum of it and figure out its parts. But he knows how to break it down, big picture. He knows how to get people organized, he communicates with people, he can score the ball, he can create for himself.”
Jenkins commands the court like a veteran and plays with a pace that can’t be taught.
“It doesn’t surprise me,” Duren said of Jenkins. “I know a lot of the world is starting to get to see him now, and it’s like, ‘Yo, who is this?’ But this is who he’s been in the two years he’s been here. Since day one, literally. The first team camp in the summer last year, he was talking crazy, popping his s—, attacking the vets.
“He’s the same guy; nothing has ever changed. I’m super proud of him, I’m super happy for him. I talked to him and was like, ‘Keep going. Be who you are. We need you to be who you are.’ And he’s doing it at a high level. We’ve got great guard play on this team.”
The spate of injuries has given Detroit’s rotational players ample opportunities to refine their games and find confidence in the process. It’s been an underlying benefit that has afforded the Pistons’ regular starters the rest necessary to avoid rushing back.
Monday’s win came on the first night of a back-to-back, but after Tuesday’s game against the Atlanta Hawks, Detroit won’t play again until Saturday when it travels to Milwaukee to take on the Bucks. Bickerstaff said pregame that both Cunningham and Thompson were “trending in the right direction.”
But considering the depth the Pistons have, highlighted by Jenkins and Javonte Green (who added 20 points off the bench versus Indiana), Detroit is continuing to show it has the necessary tools to stay atop the Eastern Conference for the long term, especially when Duren is playing the best basketball of his career.
“Organizationally, we made the decision to continue to grow our young players, and (gave) them all a plan to see them grow,” Bickerstaff said. “(Duren) executed the plan and worked — worked, and worked and worked — all summer long to get himself in position to do what he’s done. He didn’t take much time off. He was doing two-a-days. He was dedicated to his craft to put himself in the position to be able to do this.”
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Hunter Patterson is a staff writer for The Athletic covering the Detroit Pistons. Before joining the NBA staff, Hunter was an editor on The Athletic’s news desk and provided occasional Sacramento Kings coverage. Prior to The Athletic, he worked for the NBA as a broadcasting assistant. Hunter graduated from Loyola Marymount University and earned his master’s degree in Specialized Journalism at the University of Southern California.
