Losers of nine straight entering Thursday, the Detroit Pistons hosted a Charlotte Hornets team not much further ahead in the standings and missing its best player, LaMelo Ball, due to an ankle sprain. But the short-handed Pistons were unable to capitalize, and their losing streak has now hit double digits.
The Pistons lost to the Hornets, 113-103, thanks to turnovers and poor outside shooting. They coughed up the ball 12 times in the first half, and finished the night with 19, leading to 18 Hornets points. Detroit also shot just 2-for-11 from 3 during the first half, and 7-for-21 for the night.
James Wiseman tallied a double-double with 16 points and 13 rebounds, and Cory Joseph (17 points), Jaden Ivey (16 points, six assists), and Isaiah Livers (13 points) also scored in double figures. Kelly Oubre Jr. led Charlotte with 27 points, and Terry Rozier tallied 21 points and nine assists. The Pistons were without leading scorer Bojan Bogdanovic, who missed his fourth straight game with bilateral Achilles tendinopathy. Alec Burks and Isaiah Stewart also missed the game.
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Detroit trailed by as many as 18 points after falling behind early and trailed 31-23 after the Hornets closed the opening quarter with a 16-8 run. The Pistons were sloppy out of the gate, turning the ball over eight times in the first period while shooting 9-for-23 overall and 1-for-6 from 3. A layup by Rodney McGruder cut the deficit to one late in the second. quarter, but Charlotte closed the first half with an 8-0 run, capped by a Rozier 3-pointer with seven seconds on the clock.
Charlotte kept its momentum in the second half, and Rozier knocked down a midrange shot with 8:10 to play in the third quarter to extend the Hornets’ lead to 17.
The Pistons honored the 2003 WNBA-champion Detroit Shock at halftime. Most of the roster, including the starting five — Swin Cash, Ruth Riley, Cheryl Ford, Deanna “Tweety” Nolan and Elaine Powell — and head coach and former Piston Bill Laimbeer, were in attendance for the game.
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Pistons lose one player, gain two
The Pistons suffered another injury gut punch before the game, when the team announced that Stewart will miss 3-4 weeks with a left shoulder impingement.
Stewart had already missed four games with hip soreness, and he will now potentially miss the remainder of the season. The news came three days after Hamidou Diallo sprained his right ankle, which will also likely cost him the rest of the year.
But they got two players back from the injury report as well. Jalen Duren returned from a five-game absence due to bilateral ankle soreness, and Killian Hayes also returned after missing two games with a left hand contusion. Both players checked in during the first quarter. Duren finished with eight points and nine rebounds in 21 minutes, and Hayes tallied a point and five assists in 19 minutes.
Duren looked more like his old self after enduring a cold stretch before the Pistons shut him down for five games. His first bucket of the night was a powerful one-handed dunk, after grabbing an offensive rebound and using his shoulder to bump Hornets big man Nick Richards out of the way.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit Pistons lose 10th straight, 113-103, to Charlotte Hornets