The Pistons moved to Detroit in 1957. They played in Cobo Arena (now a convention center) from 1961-1978, including their last home playoff win on April 26, 1976 (game linked below).

They moved to the Pontiac Silverdome in 1978, then the Palace of Auburn Hills in 1988. Both suburbs are 30 miles away from downtown Detroit.

They returned downtown to Little Caesar’s Arena in 2018. Tonight, 49 years and 361 days later, they once again won a playoff game in their actual home city.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/197604260DET.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Pistons

ManInShowerNumber3 | Pistons

74 | 9 hours ago

Also of note: Pistons won a playoff game in LCA even before the Red Wings, who the arena was originally built for. Pistons moved down after the fact.

jfkgoblue | Pistons

33 | 9 hours ago

Wings haven’t even played a playoff game at LCA, the Pistons have played 7 now

Weary_Restauranter

10 | 9 hours ago

I don’t follow nhl, it aren’t the redwings a blue chip nhl franchise? Why are they bad?

justWMthings03

14 | 9 hours ago

Mike Ilitch was the owner during their dominant stretch and was willing to do anything to keep their playoff streak alive at the cost of the future of the franchise. It led to a lot of trading picks and prospects for old talent to boost the team into the playoffs knowing they had no hope of actually competing.

When he died his son took over and had to basically rebuild the entire franchise from the ground up since we had very little young talent and our farm system was trash.

It was the same thing with the Tigers(wings and tigers have the same owner).

Weary_Restauranter

4 | 9 hours ago

Interesting.

Crafty_Substance_954 | Pistons

5 | 8 hours ago

Wings have also been extremely unlucky in the draft lottery, and lack the top transcendent talent as a result

actually-potato | Pistons

3 | 8 hours ago

Mike also spent way more money on the teams than his son does.

justWMthings03

4 | 8 hours ago

You must not remember the first decade of Mike’s ownership of the tigers until the NHL cap came in…

Overall, Mike spent more on the major league rosters but cheaped out bad on training and development. When chris hired yzerman there were articles about how the equipment and training were decades behind. It was the same for the minor league development with the Tigers. Chris has spent a metric fuckton to make up for decades of neglect on development.

Also, Chris doesn’t have the luxury of no cap in a top market for a sport like Mike did for 3 of the 4 cups. The NHL is capped and the tigers are a mid market team that truly can’t afford to live in the luxury tax like the Dodgers, Yankees, mets…

Pristine_Purpose_230 | Pistons

1 | 7 hours ago

Same thing with the Pistons too. Had to hire a GM just to clean up Stan Van Gundy’s mess before bringing in Troy Weaver. The only assets we had at that point were future draft picks.

Top_Of_The_Line | Supersonics

1 | an hour ago

They committed too long to their core and traded away a lot of future picks to keep their 25 year playoff streak active. Their current GM’s plan for the rebuild hasn’t worked as well as it should have and they aren’t getting good results from their depth.

kreativegaming

-4 | 8 hours ago

So some idiot decided hockey needed a salary cap. On top of that Bowman was like 2 seconds away from dying of a heart attack if he kept coaching. Since then the red wings have only hired coaches who sabotage us against the penguins year after year. Now they can barely win a game but the league will hand out championship rosters to the las Vegas Knights cause Vegas money on something.

whobroughtmehere | Pistons

1 | 20 minutes ago

1-6 > 0-0 at least

d675pdx

38 | 9 hours ago

This is a very misleading title

Akili_Smurf

13 | 7 hours ago

It’s one of those where it’s accurate and also misleading

Downtown-Tea-3018

1 | 6 hours ago

WHite flight in US cities and sprawl due to highway building was very real, sadly :(

mrleakybutthole

3 | 4 hours ago

No it isn’t lol.

They literally haven’t won in the city of Detroit in 50 years.

Suburbs of Detroit that are 30 miles away? Sure

ZestycloseZeta | West

1 | 3 hours ago

For this one, OP are correct because they used official administrative boundaries

Piston’s previous home arenas in between Cobo Arena and nowadays the LCA, they’re administered by separate local governments outside of Detroit proper

(Partially to do with “white flight” in the decades prior, as another commenter points out)

Over_Struggle_5520

5 | 9 hours ago

That’s insane what

flying_2_heaven | Pistons

5 | 9 hours ago

The Palace was like 30+ Minutes away from Downtown Detroit lol. Like three cities away from Detroit.

Arepeezy | Pistons

3 | 7 hours ago

Hamtram, Oak Park, Royal Oak, Madi Heights, Troy, Bloomfield, Auburn Hills.

Crafty_Substance_954 | Pistons

3 | 8 hours ago

Exactly…it wasn’t in Detroit

KingsElite | Kings

2 | 5 hours ago

So you admit it wasn’t Detroit

Themanaaah

1 | 9 hours ago

Hell yeah.

lifelonglurker81

1 | 9 hours ago

Bet it feels like a huge relief to get that monkey off their back. I know as a fan it feels that way.

Droppin_Dimes_Pod

1 | 3 hours ago

a deep dive of the game and their season: https://youtu.be/ss6Wf4LpKHc

The Pistons won their first playoff game in Detroit in 50 years.