The Detroit Pistons Fight Back to the Top

Two years ago, two very bad teams, the Detroit Pistons and the Brooklyn Nets, played a game that meant very little in the league’s over-all standings. To Cade Cunningham, it meant the world. Cunningham, the Pistons’ point guard, played the entire second half, scoring thirty-five points in those twenty-four minutes. He drove through bodies to the rim, hit threes, crashed the boards. But the Pistons lost, 118–112, setting the record for consecutive losses in a single N.B.A. season, with twenty-seven. Their record sunk to 2–28. In the locker room right after the game, he told his teammates, who’d missed twice as many shots as they’d made, not to “jump off the boat.” He added, “Right now is the easiest time to stand off and be on your own. We need to continue to lean on each other.”