The Detroit Pistons made a crucial second half substitution that may have cost them a win against the San Antonio Spurs
With the San Antonio Spurs in town for a difficult cross-conference battle that turned physical early, the Detroit Pistons opted to fasten forward Ausar Thompson to the bench for most of the third and all of the fourth quarter.
Logging just 3:46 of action in the second half, Thompson’s absence was felt on a night where the Pistons’ opponents were connecting on the three-ball with punishing efficiency. San Antonio’s Devin Vassell drilled seven triples in the Spurs’ 114-103 win, and as a team they shot 45% on 18 three-pointers overall.
The crucial moment that led to Thompson’s unceremonious benching arrived nearly four minutes into the third quarter. At that time, Thompson was tangled up with Jalen Duren when trying to slip between JD and Victor Wembanyama on the perimeter to close out on Vassell’s three-pointer, and that was the last play featuring Ausar for the night.
As Thompson walked towards his teammates, Pistons head coach J.B. Bickerstaff pointed to the bench, seemingly indicating that Thompson’s defensive lapse had cost him the opportunity to play for the time being, but Ron Holland absorbed what would have otherwise been Ausar’s minutes from that point on.
After the game, Bickerstaff explained what went into the decision to stick with Holland during crunch time against the Spurs without providing any specific tactical details surrounding his two-pronged move to bench All-Defensive first team candidate Ausar Thompson.
"I thought Ron was playing well, gave Ron extra minutes,” Bickerstaff said.
Short and sweet, just like Thompson’s appearance in the second half.
The Spurs continued to hit open shots on the perimeter in the fourth quarter, and Bickerstaff’s Pistons were unable to close the gap at home against a red-hot San Antonio squad that won their ninth consecutive game on Monday night.
To Holland’s credit, the second-year forward finished the game with 15 points and 11 rebounds in an impactful reserve performance. However, Thompson has served as Detroit’s premier defender at the point of attack, so the Pistons’ 11-point loss to the Spurs begs the question of whether AT could’ve helped swing the balance in the home squad’s favor with the backing of a raucous Little Caesars Arena crowd behind him.
Bickerstaff spoke with the media after the Pistons’ 126-111 win over the New York Knicks last week, and Detroit’s head coach took some time to highlight Thompson’s unique defensive ability that puts Thompson’s benching against San Antonio in a new light.
“He’s been so good at it that he’s superseded our system,” Bickerstaff said. “We allow him to do things that we don’t allow other guys to do because of his ability to impact, and we make shifts behind him because we know what he’s going to do on the perimeter and that’s because of his unique ability. It’s nothing schematically that we’ve done, it’s what he’s earned the freedom to do because of his talent.”
Perhaps Bickerstaff has outlined situations with Thompson where he’s given a longer leash to hunt steals on the perimeter, but the line was drawn in the second half against the Spurs after Ausar missed his coverage on Vassell. Either way, the Pistons' coach had a message to send to his third-year forward in an effort to snuff out what he viewed as a poor defensive habit in the regular season before it crops up as a repeat issue during the playoffs.
Young teams like the Pistons inevitably work through growing pains, and Thompson still has room to grow to bring his defense to the level Bickerstaff knows it can reach.
Moving forward, Thompson will have an opportunity to redeem himself against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Wednesday, Feb. 25 at 7:30 pm.
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