Three members of the Detroit Pistons already played together down in Atlanta during the 2018-19 campaign on the Hawks
When the Detroit Pistons picked up Kevin Huerter at last season’s trade deadline, the Central Division squad was acquiring a veteran wing who’d already made a couple stops in the NBA. Though he developed into a double-digit scorer with three-point range in due time, Huerter entered the league in the 2018-19 season fresh out of Maryland and joined an Atlanta Hawks team that needed a positive momentum shift.
The season before, the Hawks labored to a 24-58 record in the Eastern Conference under Mike Budenholzer’s guidance, so the hope was that Huerter could be part of a youthful shift that steered the team in the right direction. In fact, Huerter joined a locker room with two players— Taurean Prince and John Collins— who were already established with the Hawks, and that trio is obviously set to reunite this season on the Pistons.
Back then, Collins took a major leap forward by averaging 19.5 points and 9.8 rebounds per game as a second-year player, but the Wake Forest product was yet to develop the long-range shot that he’ll be carrying with him to the Motor City this year. Prince, on the other hand, turned in a productive third-year campaign by posting 13.5 points and 3.6 rebounds per game with a 39% conversion rate from beyond the arc.
Now almost a decade later, Pistons President of Basketball Operations Trajan Langdon has brought all three players into the Motor City to help Detroit make a deeper run in the playoffs for Cade Cunningham’s sixth season as a pro. All three players should bring a level of experience and professionalism to the equation along with their long-range shooting profile, but Collins is most likely to walk into the starting lineup as the team’s Tobias Harris replacement.
During the summer, Langdon opted to re-sign Huerter to a three-year, $27 million deal to stay with the Pistons amid all the turnover elsewhere on the roster considering trades were needed to bring players like Collins and Prince into the fold. Though Huerter was injured midway through the playoffs with a hip flexor ailment that forced his absence, the veteran wing was beginning to settle in and find his groove in Detroit. Pistons head coach J.B. Bickerstaff had started to turn to Huerter as one of the first players off the bench toward the tail end of Detroit’s regular season campaign, so the eight-year pro will serve as one of the second-unit anchors this year, likely alongside Prince.
Coming to the Motor City from elsewhere in the Central Division, Prince has been busy during the summertime working out with his new teammates in an attempt to smoothly transition to the Pistons. Prince was spotted at an offseason run with Cunningham and Ausar Thompson recently, so the Baylor product should come into training camp ready to go.
On that note, Detroit’s training camp opens up on Monday, and the biggest question is whether or not Jalen Duren will have signed a contract by that time. If not, do not expect for JD to be part of Monday’s activity, but it’s a situation to keep an eye on with the qualifying offer deadline rapidly approaching on Oct. 1.
