Only positive overreactions for the Pistons’ second preseason win

The Pistons can use three guards effectively!

The Detroit Pistons started the game with Cade Cunningham, Ausar Thompson and Killian Hayes with Isaiah Stewart and Jalen Duren. We’re not going to get into all of Stew’s missed shots (remember, this is all positive) but instead focus on how wide open they all were.

Sure, part of this was that OKC was daring him to shoot it, but the other part is that the Pistons were effective with dribble penetration and setting up teammates. Cunningham, Hayes and Thompson were all getting into the teeth of the defense and either finding the shooters on the perimeter or hitting the cutters going to the rim.

I really loved Cade, Ausar and Killian defensively together, as their size was making things difficult for the Thunder on the perimeter. They were also getting out on the break and making the right pass most of the time.

Now imagine that some of those three-point attempts were being taken by Bojan Bogdanovic and you can see the vision of the Pistons going small. I expect we’ll see Bojan in there as a four with this group instead of Stewart, but also with Stewart as a small-ball five to keep even more shooting on the floor. Beef Stew is going to start knocking some of those down, so the Pistons may have something using Cade, Killian and Ausar together.