Pistons Frightening Everybody

The non-aligned NBA assistant coach, his patience failing, tried again to explain to the sports writer who hypothesized the Los Angeles Lakers could, too, beat the Detroit Pistons in the NBA Finals this year.

The Lakers “aren’t as good as the Pistons,” he said. “Not by a lot. Detroit’s guards are better; their bench is better. Would you take (Byron) Scott over any of the other three (the other three being Isiah Thomas, Joe Dumars and Magic Johnson)? The Pistons would win in five or six.”

This appears clear: If Detroit keeps playing like it is and stays healthy, it’s the NBA champion. No Knicks, no 76ers, no Bulls, no Jazz, no Spurs, no Lakers, no Trail Blazers, no Suns. Pistons.

“They expose all our weaknesses,” Michael Jordan said after Detroit held the Bulls to 11 fourth-quarter points last week.

The Pistons’ win streak was now 12 games, after losing one of 13 in January and February. That’s 25 of the last 26 since Jan. 23 and a 51-15 record and a two-game lead over the Lakers for the best record in the league.

And, although the Bulls have been almost as hot recently, the Central Division has no race. That’s over, too.

“You would think so,” Detroit center Bill Laimbeer said.

“It’s mind-boggling,” Piston Coach Chuck Daly said. “I hope nobody wakes me up, or us. It means that we have a lot of guys who are dedicated to playing well, who are interested in competing every night and willing to pay that price. And we’re talented.”

The Pistons shut the Bulls down Friday with their second unit from last season--John Salley, Dennis Rodman, James Edwards, Vinnie Johnson--plus starter Dumars. Mark Aguirre was nowhere to be found. Yet this group went on a 22-6 run in seven minutes to blow Chicago out of its own building.

“We sit down sometimes,” Dumars said, “and look at the schedule and say ‘If we take them one game at a time, we can run off a string of games here, we can run off 10 here, we can win six here.’ We realize what’s ahead of us before we get through it. So we’re prepared. Obviously we didn’t look (this) far ahead.”

There they sit, the Atlanta Hawks, like the bomb still capable of destruction that they are. If Atlanta can hold on and get in the playoffs as Cleveland accelerates and Indiana falls apart, the Hawks could still be big trouble. Especially if they avoid meeting Detroit in the opening round.

Atlanta has come from having almost no guards a couple of weeks ago to having five--Doc Rivers, John Battle, Spud Webb, Kenny Smith and John Long. Smith, acquired from Sacramento, is still learning the system, and the Hawks don’t have time to teach him.

“We have walked the coals,” Coach Mike Fratello said. “That’s not to say that we’re over it. I don’t know where we are, really, right now as a team. It’s hard to say. Rivers (coming off a herniated-disk injury) has a ways to go and has had one real practice. Cak (forward Jon Koncak) is still real sore.”