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NBA Playoff Predictions
2008 Philadelphia 76ers v. Detroit Pistons Playoff Predictions
The seventh seeded
Philadelphia 76ers and the second seeded Detroit
Pistons kick off their series on Sunday April
20th at 6:00 pm EST on TNT. Despite the Pistons
having home court advantage and a large edge in
terms of postseason experience, many experts see
this one ending up much closer than expected.
Find out how Jimmy Boyd sees this series
unfolding in his 76ers/Pistons round one NBA
Playoff predictions.
The Arguments:
There's no doubt that the 76ers have come on strong in
the second half of the season to emerge as one of the
hottest teams in the league heading into the playoffs.
That has gained this young team a ton of confidence
which is why we could see a series. These teams have
split their four regular season matchups with all four
games being close. But the most recent two have gone to
Philly and that will be another big confidence booster
for the 76ers.
But here's the reality. Since 1984, a number seven seed
has only defeated a number two seed four times, and it
hasn't happened in 10 years. The Knicks were the last
team to do it, and the first round was only a five-game
series at that point. The Pistons have reached the
conference finals in five of their last six trips to the
postseason, and they hold the fifth best all-time home
winning percentage in the playoffs. In other words, we
can't bet against the Pistons here.
With Chauncey Billups, Rip Hamilton, Tayshaun Prince,
Rasheed Wallace, and Antonio McDyess, the Pistons have
one of the most balanced lineups in all of basketball.
The reason why the Pistons have been so successful is
because they defend. The Pistons finished the regular
season as the number one ranked defensive team in terms
of points allowed, number two ranked in three-point
shooting percentage defense, and number three in overall
shooting percentage defense. Also, with coach Flip
Saunders going to his bench so often this season, the
Pistons have developed a much deeper team than they
thought they would have heading into the season.
The 76ers are just 18-23 on the road this season, and if
you can't win on the road you're going to struggle in
the playoffs. While Philly's defense has been much
improved this year, it won't be enough to win this
series. The 76ers really struggle to score the
basketball at times as you might expect from the 23rd
ranked offensive team in the league and the 30th ranked
three-point shooting team. Philly is not good enough on
the perimeter to challenge a Pistons team that won't
give them anything easy inside.
Prediction:
Pistons in 5 games
Make sure you check out all of Jimmy Boyd's 2008 NBA
playoff predictions to help you break down each and
every series through the NBA Finals. And Sign up for one
of our low-cost NBA picks
packages for the most winners this postseason.
We now have all of the first round
games broken down series by series:
Updated April 17th, 2008
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