Pistons-Lakers Pregame

Late game tonight for the Detroit Pistons at Los Angeles, with tipoff taking place at 10:30 est. The game marks the start of hell week for Detroit with two back-to-back road games against the Lakers and Portland, then Utah and Phoenix.

Tonights game will be a battle of hobbled teams with Detroit and L.A. hit by injuries. For the Pistons Tayshaun Prince and Richard Hamilton will be out again, while the Lakers will be missing Pau Gasol and Luke Walton. Also Kobe Bryant will not be 100 percent with a groin injury.

With Gasol out I expect the Pistons to utilize their small ball line-up quite a bit. This is going to put Rodney Stuckey against Ron Artest and Ben Gordon on Bryant.

Ryan Pretzer has a nice profile of the Gordon-Bryant match-up which you can read here.

Pretzer notes that Gordon has struggled in the past when going against Bryant. Gordon also had his worst outing as a Piston in their last game, going 1-16 from the field. With Bryant injured and probably unable to play 40 minutes, Gordon might be able to exploit him more than usual.

Stuckey on Artest looks to be a bruising match-up on paper. Both are small for the three position but are considered beefy at their more natural guard positions.

Stuckey might look to defer to Gordon early to get him going. Eventually though, Stuckey is going to try and blow by Artest. Ron doesn't posses the speed to contain Stuckey anymore, so Rodney should find some success.

The Pistons are underdogs going up against the reigning champs but they stand a fighting chance to walk away  with a win. If Detroit's guards can all keep the ball moving and Gordon can match the output by Bryant then the Pistons should get a much needed win. Those are big ifs though.