Pistons 106, Wizards 103
The forward progress was there. One injured Wizards starter, Mike Miller, returned from a shoulder injury with a season-high 20 points, newly signed Earl Boykins played far bigger than his 5-foot-5 frame in his first Washington appearance, also scoring 20, and a complete team effort produced arguably best stretch of the young season.
But the familiar steps backward again prevailed, as low energy early, inconsistency late and another mixed bag from Gilbert Arenas (19 points on 18 shots, 10 assists) resulted in a sixth straight defeat, a 106-103 loss to Detroit in front of a sellout crowd at Verizon Center.
“No one feels sorry for you in this league,” said Wizards head coach Flip Saunders. “Don’t ever think it can’t get any worse. That’s how it is. But from my standpoint, we did some better things. But the bottom line still boils down to one thing, you can’t have a team score 20 points off your turnovers and beat anybody.”
After leading by as many as ten in the third quarter, the Wizards (2-7) managed one field goal and turned the ball over three times during the final five minutes, four seconds of the fourth. The one basket was a meaningless three-pointer by Arenas, who took just three shots in the final period.
Down, 101-100, with 16.1 seconds to play, Washington botched a chance to put the pressure on the Pistons (5-4) at the line, as DeShawn Stevenson committed a deadball foul, allowing Ben Gordon (game-high 29 points) to make a technical free throw and then two more freebies after getting fouled again on the ensuing awarded possession.
“It’s like we’re inventing ways to put ourselves into a hole,” said Saunders.
Arenas started the digging early, missing all six of his first-quarter shots while Charlie Villanueva scored 13 of his 25 points to give the Pistons a 27-18 lead after one.
But Boykins provided a spark off the bench to close the gap, with 11 points and two assists in the second, including a last-second feed to Arenas, who bombed a three-pointer from 33 feet just before the first half buzzer to cut the Detroit lead to 55-47.
Arenas then hit consecutive threes as Washington opened the second half making 10 of 13 shots, including six in a row during a 17-8 run that was capped by Arenas finding Andray Blatche (13 points, 11 rebounds) on the fast break for the first Wizards lead of the game, 64-63.
But after Caron Butler (16 points, 9 rebounds) finished his own miss to make it 78-69 with 2:50 left in the third, things unraveled quickly, as Will Bynum (20 points, 6 assists) finished the quarter with his own 9-1 run to make it 80-78.
“The third quarter at the end is where I think we kind of lost it,” said Miller. “A good team, when you’re really playing well, you push it 14, 16 [points]. I think it came back to two or four. That’s tough.”
It won’t get any easier, either, as the Wizards next host Cleveland on Wednesday before a two-game trip to Oklahoma City and San Antonio. If there’s one silver lining, however, it’s that forward Antawn Jamison is expected to make his debut against the Cavaliers.
“The funny part is with Antawn coming back now is now we gotta gel and get him back into the flow,” said Arenas. “Hopefully it can be a quick turnaround. Players have been dropping, players have been adding. We just don’t have the rhythm that we would like right now. But we’ve never been really a team that played in November very well. Since I’ve been here, December’s always been our [time of the] year.”
