The Detroit Pistons ended their six-year playoff drought in 2025, but they wouldn’t go too far on their long-awaited return. The New York Knicks beat the Pistons in six games in the first round, but former Piston John Salley stated during an appearance on Vlad TV that he believes the NBA rigged the series.
“They cheated the Pistons,” Salley said. “And we had to deal with that in Detroit, knowing that it was an unbelievable blatant foul, and the referees the next day say, ‘We’re sorry we missed it.’ Right there, I became a conspiracy theorist, believing it was fixed.”
Salley was referring to the controversial ending to Game 4 at Little Caesars Arena. The Pistons looked set to tie the series at 2-2 when they led 79-68 in the early stages of the fourth quarter, but the Knicks stormed back and took a 94-93 lead in the final minute. That set the stage for one of the bigger refereeing blunders in these playoffs.
The Pistons had the ball with 11.1 seconds remaining and would end up getting two opportunities to take the lead. First, Cade Cunningham missed a mid-range shot, and following a scramble for the rebound, Tim Hardaway Jr. would pick up the loose ball at the corner.
Hardaway then quite clearly managed to draw contact from Josh Hart by pump-faking before shooting a three-pointer, but the officials surprisingly didn’t call a foul. The Pistons were left fuming while the Knicks celebrated.
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If a foul had been called, Hardaway would have had a chance to put the Pistons up two points with just over a second remaining. You’d have fancied their chances of holding on and tying the series, but instead, they went down 3-1. Pistons head coach J.B. Bickerstaff made it clear postgame that a foul should have been called.
“There’s contact on Tim Hardaway’s jump shot,” Bickerstaff said. “I don’t know any other way around it. There’s contact on his jump shot. The guy leaves his feet, he’s at Timmy’s mercy.”
In the Pool Report interview after the game, crew chief David Guthrie admitted they made a mistake.
“During live play, it was judged that Josh Hart made a legal defensive play. After postgame review, we observed that Hart makes body contact that is more than marginal to Hardaway Jr., and a foul should have been called.”
The NBA’s L2M report for the game also confirmed that a foul should have been called on Hart. While Salley, who won two titles with the Pistons in 1989 and 1990, reckons some foul play was involved, it’s a stretch to make such an accusation over one bad call.
The Pistons went 0-3 at home against the Knicks, and if they had managed to win one of the two home games besides this one, the series would have gone seven. They were in a fantastic position to win Game 6 in Detroit, too, as they led 112-105 with less than three minutes remaining.
The Knicks would close the game on an 11-1 run, though, to knock the Pistons out of the playoffs. While it was a brutal end to the season, it was still a great campaign overall for this young team that finished sixth in the East with a 44-38 record.
This was the first taste of the postseason for the likes of Cunningham, Jalen Duren, and Ausar Thompson. The experience will help them improve, and you’d expect the Pistons to make the playoffs again in 2025-26.
