The Pistons Did Everything Wrong

There was a moment early in the first quarter of Sunday's Game 7 between the Detroit Pistons and Cleveland Cavaliers when James Harden had the ball and was isolated against Tobias Harris. "James Harden, acquired from the Clippers, this was the big move that the Cavaliers made for moments like this," said play-by-play man Ian Eagle moments before Harden drove to the lane and kicked a grenade out to Evan Mobley in the corner, who missed a shot as the clock expired. I smiled to myself when this happened, and did so again a few possessions later when Harden committed the first of his two shot-clock violations. I was thinking about the blog you are reading right now, and how the story of this game, as it has been so many times before, would be about Harden melting down in the playoffs. Well, I was partially right. Harden did indeed submit what might have been his worst performance yet in a big playoff game—nine points on 2-10 shooting, 0-6 from three—but the Pistons unveiled a surefire method for squandering a vintage "Big Game" James performance: simply have your entire team play like James Harden did. The Pistons got absolutely rocked, 125-94, in what might have been the most dispiriting loss in a postseason that has been full of them. Game 7s rarely live up to expectations, but this one fell especially short. A nervy, low-scoring contest full of exhausted players can still be fun if the score remains close, and even a blowout can be neat if it happens in front of a raucous home crowd or is the result of the superior team accruing tactical advantages over the course of the series. This was the worst kind of blowout, though: a wire-to-wire domination in front of a crestfallen home crowd that offers little explanation aside from "The Pistons played like shit."