Well whaddaya know? The Pistons came through after all.

No big first round upset this year.  No trade demands, no coaching changes, and no depressing, reminiscent talk of Pistons’ past. Yet.

The Detroit Pistons live to see another day, and they did it in powerful fashion with an utter annihalation of the Philadelphia 76ers on the Sixers’ home court. We saw, once again, the Pistons that can win any, and I mean any, game when they decide to “turn it on.”

The question is: can they keep that intensity switch on? Or will it slowly slide down to off again, revealing the team we saw in Games 1 and 3?

I sure hope it’s Door #1.

Rip Hamilton- what more can I say about this guy? Night after night he’s running and gunning and hitting every shot he puts up. He finished with a rock-solid 24 points on 9-14 shooting. Wow, looks like when they say they’ve “been in these situations before”, they mean it.

Chauncey continued his rise to his former self with his second straight excellent offensive showing. He only missed 3 of his 11 attempts and dished 7 assists while committing only a single turnover.

The score after the first 12 minutes: Pistons: 30, Sixers: 12.

Thank God I don’t have to see Samuel “SD stands for ’strong defense’” Dalembert’s frohawk anymore.  Ever since he created that monster the Sixers haven’t been able to do squat, especially on defense. Thanks, I guess.

Although this was a blowout and everything seemingly went right, I still have to complain about sketchy reffing by the officials.  I know, I know we’re used to it right? Still, there were far too many calls going in favor or Reggie Evans’ flops and way too many clean blocks by smothering Detroit defense that weren’t recognized as clean.

Things kind of got messy when the bench came in in the 2nd quarter, but they eventually pulled it together and did well in the 4th quarter keeping points on the board.

Dyess continues to be an inspiration for Detroit, despite his lower minutes.  If anyone wants it on this team, it’s him.

If the Pistons can continue this kind of teamwork and sharpshooting into Round 2, Orlando doesn’t stand a chance in hell. However, if they let their guard down again, Dwight Howard and Hedo Turkoglu will be waiting anxiously to punish them for their mistakes.

The Eastern Conference semifinals kick off Saturday night at 7:30 in Auburn Hills.