Pistons fall to Jazz for 25th straight loss, hear chants of ‘sell the team’،
DETROIT — Kelly Olynyk scored 25 points and the short-handed Utah Jazz beat Detroit 119-111 Thursday night for the Pistons' 25th straight loss, one short of the NBA single-season record.
The 2010-11 Cleveland Cavaliers and 2013-14 Philadelphia 76ers share the record with 26. The 76ers hold the overall mark at 28, a skid that began in the 2014-15 season and continued into 2015- 16.
“I want to be careful with my words, because this one hurts more than most,” first-year coach Monty Williams said. “A team that played last night got [50] points on turnovers and rebounds. It is incredibly difficult to understand how we can be outclassed in these categories. »
The Pistons fell to 2-26, with the crowd chanting “Sell the team! Sell the team!” at the end in a loud statement to owner Tom Gores and his company Platinum Equity. Detroit will be back in action Saturday night in Brooklyn.
“We're not bad 2-26, we're not that bad,” said Cade Cunningham, who led Detroit with 28 points and 10 assists. “I think we can turn the tide. We can play a much better style of basketball.”
Utah played without four of its top seven scorers — Lauri Markkanen, Jordan Clarkson, Keyonte George and Talen Horton-Tucker — for the second straight night following its loss at Cleveland on Wednesday.
“It’s a really, really good team win for us,” Jazz coach Will Hardy said. “It’s a tough game to play – a second night in a row on the road with a bunch of guys out.”
Collin Sexton added 19 points for the Utah Jazz and Ochai Agbaji had 18. Jaden Ivey scored 24 points for Detroit and Marvin Bagley III had 22, but no one else had more than eight.
Utah led 90-88 early in the fourth quarter and took advantage of Detroit's poor shooting to make it 100-93 with 7:40 left.
The Pistons missed their first six 3-point attempts of the fourth, but Bojan Bogdanovic made one to make it 104-100 with 4:40 left. Olynyk's 3-pointer against his former team gave the Jazz a seven-point lead and Sexton's shot made it 115-106 with 1:37 left.
“Rebounding is something we've emphasized all season, and it's definitely part of our identity on the offensive side of the ball,” Hardy said after his team finished with 15 offensive rebounds.
Sexton added two free throws to make it an 11-point game.
The Pistons were 1 of 10 from 3 in the fourth quarter.
“We had a chance to win down the stretch, but we just weren't strong enough,” Cunningham said. “It’s a story that no one wants to be a part of.”
