Knicks at Pistons
The Detroit Pistons have no intention of surrendering their spot in the top eight in the Eastern Conference and announced their plan to go deep in the playoffs by topping the East-leading Cleveland Cavaliers on Thursday. The Pistons will try to maintain the same focus when they take a step down in competition by hosting the New York Knicks on Saturday.
Detroit, which occupies the No. 7 spot in the East, can get back to .500 for the first time since it was 14-14 on Dec. 16 with a win on Saturday. "It's probably the happiest our locker room has been all year and it wasn’t just getting a win, it wasn’t just beating Cleveland, it was the way we did it," Pistons coach Stan Van Gundy told reporters after Thursday's 106-101 triumph. "We really had to fight in the game and guys felt good about it. We get another chance - we’ve had several - to get to .500 on Saturday." The Knicks dropped three of their last four games and have been off since falling 104-93 at Milwaukee on Wednesday. Star forward Carmelo Anthony sat out a win at Orlando on Monday to rest a sore left knee but returned at Milwaukee and scored 16 points on 6-of-13 shooting in 40 minutes.
TV: 5 p.m. ET, MSG (New York), FSN Detroit
ABOUT THE KNICKS (26-39): Point guard Derrick Rose is coming to the end of a tumultuous first and possibly final season in New York and is thriving of late with 20 or more points in three of the last four games. The former MVP scored a team-high 26 points on 13-of-16 shooting to go with six assists in Wednesday's loss. The strong effort came after Rose revealed to reporters that he is still experiencing some blurred vision in his left eye stemming from an orbital fracture suffered two years ago, and he remains cautious of the eye when driving the lane and absorbing contact.
ABOUT THE PISTONS (32-33): Detroit, which plays Cleveland again on Tuesday, believed at the start of the season that it had the type of team that could make a run in the East as long as it managed to stay consistent, and the players still believe in that message. "In this locker room, we know we belong in the discussion," small forward Tobias Harris told reporters. "We know we are better than what we have displayed at many times throughout the year. Hopefully it’s a win that gets us going and gets us flowing. But like we all talked about, we have to be consistent with the effort and have that will and grit that we had all game (Thursday). We have to play every game like that." Harris scored 15 points in a team-high 41 minutes on Thursday and grabbed nine rebounds.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. Anthony, who averages 23.1 points, failed to score 20 in any of his first four games this month.
2. Pistons SG Kentavious Caldwell-Pope scored 15 points on Thursday after totaling eight in the previous two games.
3. The home team took each of the last five in the series, including Detroit's 102-89 home win on Nov. 1.