4 hours ago
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DETROIT — I must confess: I was a little confused when the assignment came in. I thought when the boss wrote “Knicks/Pistons” into my schedule boxes this week, I was being assigned to cover a best-of-seven basketball series.
It turns out, that was only half true.
The Knicks are, indeed, a basketball team, founded in 1946, winner of two NBA championships in 1970 and 1973 (meaning the last time they won, every word written about team was clacked out on typewriters), qualifier for six other NBA Finals, one-time employer of such notable basketball players as Richie Guerin and Clyde Frazier, Willis Reed and Patrick Ewing, Bernard King and Carmelo Anthony.
The Pistons, I have discovered, through intensive research the past few days, also dabble in basketball, and have been doing it even longer than the Knicks have, established in 1941 as the Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons, originally for the old National Basketball League. They have three NBA championships. They have been led by the likes of Dave Bing and Bob Lanier, by Isiah Thomas and Joe Dumars, by Chauncey Billups and Ben Wallace.
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