In Detroit, the black-eyed Susan grows along lonely highways and in vacant lots. It pushes through gravel and broken glass. It survives heat that cracks the earth and winters that freeze it solid. When the wind bends its stem, it cracks back in place.

Its petals are a grungy yellow, the shade of anxiety, orbiting a bruised center. Black-eyed, signaling it can take a punch. It’s the kind of flower Pistons legend Dennis Rodman would wear in his hair. Hard to kill. Just like the Detroit Pistons.

It was the perfect symbol during their bleak three-season stretch (2021-24). They finished the 2023-24 season 14-68, the worst record in franchise history. They went winless for an entire calendar month. They lost a record-setting 28 games in a row, and Monty Williams, hired to stabilize a rebuild, lasted only one season before being run out of town. The organization hit bottom with an 82-game public elegy.

To understand what happened next, remember what Detroit was at their apex.

At the start of the century, the Pistons were the kings of the East in late May and early June. The 2004 championship team beat a Lakers roster built on Hall-of-Fame star power: Shaquille O’Neal, Kobe Bryant, Gary Payton and Karl Malone.

The Pistons beat them with defense and collective force: five fingers forming an iron fist. The only roughnecks to dethrone Shaq and Kobe in the Finals.

After the ‘04 title, they whiffed on young players, while their No 2 pick in the ‘03 draft, Darko Miličić, continued to haunt their chances of winning a second chip. Detroit made the playoffs twice between 2011 and 2023 and were swept both times. Their three title banners continued to collect dust.

Cade Cunningham was taken first overall in 2021. Then, a series of consecutive No 5 picks that brought in defensive demons: Jaden Ivey in 2022. Ausar Thompson in 2023. Ron Holland in 2024. It was clear Detroit had individual talent, but not the leadership to make them a team. After Williams was fired, JB Bickerstaff took over the team in the summer of 2024. While head coach in Cleveland, he remembered the games against Detroit as two teams battling in the mud over a knife. The Pistons played hard. They just couldn’t finish.

For Bickerstaff’s first training camp, he had to burn the loss out of their pores. Bickerstaff believed Detroit could anchor themselves in defense and toughness the way earlier eras had, but within the modern game. That approach aligned with Trajan Langdon, who took over basketball operations in 2024. Langdon valued structure and consistency. He had played in a disciplined system at Duke and worked in the San Antonio Spurs front office.

Langdon’s first question was about Cunningham. After years of losing and coaching changes, did he still believe in Detroit? Reflecting on that 28-game losing streak, he revealed how differently he sees the game: “When we had that streak, we were talking championship, believe it or not … To be where we are now is cool. But it’s just a step in this process. We have a long way to go.”

Cunningham was raised in Arlington, Texas – concrete, beige, unromantic. He learned early how to build something out of nothing.

Some pieces were already in place. Jalen Duren was a powerful interior presence who could rebound and finish in pick-and-rolls. Isaiah Stewart brought energy and defensive versatility. Thompson showed tricked-out defensive instincts as a rookie, capable of guarding multiple positions and applying full-court pressure. The defensive potential was obvious from the jump.

Langdon knew his kinetic young core needed veteran guidance. So he began adding vets who didn’t need to be taught professional habits. In the season following the 14-win collapse, Detroit won 44 games and returned to the playoffs. But the defense! After ranking near the bottom of the league in defensive efficiency, the Pistons clawed, snarled and gnashed into the top tier. Midway through the 2024-25 season, Detroit rose to second in defensive rating. This off-season, Langdon added Duncan Robinson, Caris LeVert and Javonte Green, while seeing huge growth from Daniss Jenkins and Paul Reed.

As the NBA moved forward, the Pistons embraced the physicality of the past. They send waves of players who embrace contact and contest everything, like piranha stripping you down to bone.

They currently stand atop the Eastern Conference as the projected No 1 seed. Cunningham has cemented his place as the best guard in the East. No one else can match his combination of defense, IQ, size and table-setting. This season, he’s a top-three MVP candidate, averaging 25.4 points, 5.8 rebounds and 9.8 assists. He leads the league in total assists (508), and his on-off numbers quantify the assault. With Cunningham on the floor, Detroit outscores teams by 10.2 points per 100 possessions, a plus-7.2 on/off swing. The Pistons can imbibe their enemies before strangling them with their own weaknesses.

As Cunningham’s pick-and-roll partner, the 6ft 10in, 250lb Duren is producing 18.5 points and 10.8 rebounds a night on 63.4% shooting. Almost everything he does happens at the rim. His 7.3 field goals per game are mostly dunks, placing him among the league’s leaders in two-point makes. Nearly all his attempts come inside 10 feet – meaning the last thing defenders see are his pearly whites before the ball gets shoved through the cylinder.

The Pistons clear 60 points in the paint per game and have topped 70 on multiple occasions during their midseason surge. Duren’s rim finishing and offensive rebounding are central drivers. But like every great Pistons team of the past, their weakness lies in shooting. They’re 22nd in three-point percentage (34.9%), 27th in attempts (31.8), and 28th in makes (11.1) per game.

Pistons fans have seen it repeatedly: 6-of-31 in Denver, 7-of-36 against San Antonio, 6-of-27 against Cleveland. When sniper Duncan Robinson doesn’t have it, the offense has no other release valve. Now Cunningham sees two and three bodies at the nail, and the half-court bogs down into contested pull-ups or late-clock bailouts. Detroit can win the possession game, but in the playoffs, that inability to consistently generate and convert volume threes can cause an upset.

The mid-season trade of Ivey for Kevin Huerter raised their floor but lowered their ceiling. Now, when Cade has an inefficient night, the Pistons don’t have a reliable secondary shot-creator to stabilize from the perimeter.

And that brings us back to Bickerstaff. His regular-season résumé has been strong at 343–342 overall (.501) and an excellent 88–52 (.629) in Detroit so far – but his playoff history raises legitimate questions. He owns a 9–19 postseason record (.321), including a 2–4 mark in his first postseason in Detroit last year. Most notably, he was outcoached by Tom Thibodeau in back-to-back postseasons with the Cavaliers and the Detroit Pistons.

Like the Pistons these past few years, the black-eyed Susan gets stepped on as soon as it breaks through the soil. As long as the stem holds, it survives. Detroit has survived three of the worst seasons in NBA history. Now they’re looking to get their lick back.

Inside the locker room, the phrase “New Bad Boys” circulates – a nod to the championship brutality of the early 1990s. Sometimes that edge spills over. On 9 February against the Charlotte Hornets, it did.

Duren and Charlotte’s Moussa Diabaté met beneath the rim, breath to breath – first a shove, then a swing. Bodies flooded the lane. Miles Bridges doubled back toward the scrum. Then Isaiah Stewart – “Beef Stew,” Detroit’s resident enforcer – came flying off the bench and into the chaos, as if summoned by the franchise’s ghosts.

Because in that instant, time spiraled. In its unraveling, Stewart’s punch no longer belonged just to him. It was Rodman’s, Bill Laimbeer’s, Ben Wallace’s. Dozens of Pistons players smashing through time and into the mouth of their opponents. In the same way, the team’s name is stitched into their jerseys; their identity is etched in the marrow of the players who bear it.

Just like the Malice at the Palace two decades prior, suspensions were handed down. Stewart got seven games, mainly for leaving the bench to fight, and of course, his reputation. Duren received a two-game suspension for initiating the scrap. Even with their two biggest dogs out, the Pistons’ rise continues.

As of early March, Detroit run the East. Two years earlier, they had been synonymous with losing. Like the black-eyed Susans that grow through broken glass, the Pistons took the punch, spat blood-soaked teeth and kept standing. Now, it’s Detroit’s turn to hit back.