Fingers Will Point at Flip if They Lose

<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">AUBURN HILLS - Whoever thought it would come to this? Of all things to question about the Pistons, who'd have guessed it would be their confidence?

This is the team that went into New Jersey down 3-2 two years ago, on the heels of not just a three-game losing streak, but a tripleovertime home loss, to boot, beat the Nets after spotting them a 13-2 lead and then came home to win Game 7 in a rout.

Lack of confidence? The Pistons of Rasheed Wallace and Big Shot Billups and Big Ben?

But wait.

It's not quite the same team after all, is it?

That team hadn't yet won a championship. That team hadn't lived since November, as this one has, with everyone proclaiming it the best in basketball by a mile. That team ... had Larry Brown.

This one has Flip Saunders. He's the only apparent signifi cant difference. And if the Pistons go down in this series the way they've gone down in three straight mind-blowing losses - almost meekly, with no evidence of the big-play swagger that came to be their trademark - then there's only one apparent conclusion to be drawn:

This inexplicable lack of confidence somehow traces back to the head coach.

And if you think that doesn't put him under enormous pressure as the Pistons head to Cleveland for a make-or-break Game 6, consider that less than six months after the Red Wings hired Mike Babcock, he was the dean of Detroit coaches.

There are only two certainties to modern professional coaching: you get rich and you get fi red.

"No more pressure than what the players are feeling," Saunders said after Thursday's practice, the morning after the third straight loss to a Cleveland team that got to the second round completely satisfied with itself for having survived the fi rst. "We're all here to win a championship."

If the Pistons lose to 21-year-old LeBron James, nobody is going to say they failed to win that championship because of Rasheed's twisted ankle or his fl apping gums. This one's going on Flip's resume.

They won one NBA title and came about three good minutes away from repeating under Brown with essentially the same team. And it was a team that stamped itself as an extremely agreeable bunch that would go in whatever direction their coach pointed them.

So if they take the exit ramp out of the second round, the loud assumption will be that it was Saunders at the wheel.

I'd say 98 percent of the grousing going on in Detroit barber shops and beer joints about Saunders is garbage. My e-mails Thursday morning were stuffed with complaints that ranged from Rasheed played too much on a bum ankle to Rasheed needed to be on the floor in the fourth quarter.

I've played, watched and written about basketball for 40 years, but am I going to get into an X and O debate with Flip Saunders? Come on. That's like a remedial math student questioning the calculus of a Harvard professor.

Here's what I will say: Saunders came to Detroit renowned as nothing less than an offensive genius. He'd been in the league 10 years and nobody had yet to figure out his offense, it was said. So how come against Cleveland, a team never acknowledged as more than barely competent defensively, the Pistons suddenly can't get the shots they want?

How come they haven't routinely exploited a Cleveland defensive tactic - switching bigs for littles on every Pistons screen, leaving centers isolated on guards and guards to check the likes of Rasheed Wallace and Antonio McDyess in the post - that screams of desperation?

When they're paying you $5 million a year, you'd better come up with something in the course of a playoff series that makes your boss go, "Hmmm. That was a pretty shrewd little coaching maneuver ol' Flip just threw at the Cavs."

Never mind the fans. Do you suppose Joe Dumars has had any such moments?

And, again, we're not talking about X's and O's, or solely about the endless tactical maneuvering that changes on nearly every possession. We're talking mostly about the environment a coach creates, the way he carries himself in critical moments, the vibe he emits to his team.

If the Pistons lack confi - dence, then that indicts their coach. And all those fans perched on barber chairs and barstools can see that the Pistons doubt themselves right now, taking shots they haven't taken all year and missing the ones they have.

"It's almost like when you're in a fi ght," Saunders said, "and you don't expect to get knocked down. You get knocked down and you're a little bit groggy when you get back up. You keep on fi ghting through, and you put yourself in a situation to throw some haymakers back at them. We've got to get in that situation where we get our aggressiveness back at both ends. We started to do that in the fourth quarter a little bit last night."

Here's my question: Why did Saunders essentially let the same game play out three straight times?

"We lost three in a row," Billups said. "I never thought that would happen, us get beat three in a row. But it's happened."

Billups looks lost. So does Hamilton. Rasheed Wallace wasn't playing like the most versatile big man in basketball should even before his ankle bent gruesomely. Tayshaun Prince is a wonderful fourth option, but not the guy you'd put at the center of your offense.

So you can say it's not Flip's fault that all those shots they made through the winter and into the spring are suddenly flying errant, but what's the likelier conclusion?

That a team that showed championship mettle even before it won a championship suddenly has lost its stomach for the fight? Or that the conductor of this marvelous ensemble orchestra suddenly has them off beat?

"I wouldn't say we've lost any confidence," Billups said. "When you're playing well and you're in a rhythm, of course you're going to have that little swagger. When you're not, the swagger might not be there. But that doesn't mean your confidence isn't. We've got a confident group by nature. Ask anybody in this gym are we going to win this series, I don't think you'll fi nd anybody hesitating. And not just saying it, but really believing it." </div>

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