Detroit Pistons 2019-20 schedule: 3 tough road trips
Late-season trip
It isn’t easy to go West, due to the quality of teams and drastic time change. The Pistons have to do it twice this year but this trip is the shorter of the two.
In late February the Pistons begin a four-game trip against the Portland Trail Blazers. With new-and-improved guard play of its own, if healthy, the Pistons will be tested against one of the league’s top backcourts in Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum.
The trip continues with a day off before heading to the Mountain time zone and the Mile High City. The Denver Nuggets figure to be a top team out West and should be due to the play of Nikola Jokic. It’ll be a fascinating matchup as Andre Drummond and Blake Griffin will have their hands full with a plethora of quality bigs.
Detroit will travel to Phoenix for a date with the Suns and the game is only easy on paper. The Suns should be much-improved with the additions of Ricky Rubio, Tyler Johnson, Dario Saric and Aron Baynes. There will be more depth in Phoenix. But this is the game the Pistons have to win on this trip.
The finale tips-off the March gauntlet that will give the Pistons a tough time in its playoff chase. Following Phoenix, Detroit will head to Sacramento to take on De’Aaron Fox, Marvin Bagley III and company. The Kings lost Willie Cauley-Stein but added wing depth by signing Trevor Ariza and Harrison Barnes. It’ll be an athletic group under new coach Luke Walton.