AUBURN HILLS -- Stan Van Gundy spent most of Saturday night pulling lineups out of a hat.
Somehow, in one of the craziest games of the season, it worked.
The Pistons led by 10 points after one quarter, fell behind by as many as 19 in the third and somehow ended up beating the Bulls 107-91 in a game where 30-somethings Joel Anthony and Tayshaun Prince had to figure out how to play emergency power forward.
"That was a tremendous night, and it only happened because every guy who got on the floor contributed to the win," Van Gundy said. "It was really incredible how that happened."
With Greg Monroe missing his third straight game with a knee injury and Shawne Williams sidelined by an illness, the Pistons went into the game with Anthony Tolliver as their only power forward. Tolliver then proceeded to go 2-for-7 from the floor and play just 22 minutes because of foul trouble.
That should have been curtains for the Pistons, especially against a Chicago team that is as deep inside as anyone in the league, and that's how it looked early. The first time Van Gundy went to his bench in the second quarter, the Bulls ripped off a 26-6 run and appeared to have the game well in hand.
Chicago was still rolling in the third, leading 72-53 after five minutes of the quarter, and Van Gundy decided to try something new. In came Anthony to play power forward alongside Drummond in a matchup against Pau Gasol and Joakim Noah.
"That lineup has not only never played together, it has never even practiced together," Van Gundy said. "We've never even thought about using Andre and Joel at the same time, but they made it work."
With Drummond and Anthony stabilizing the defensive end, Reggie Jackson took over on offense. He had 17 points and seven assists in the quarter and, somehow, Detroit was up 80-79 with 12 minutes to play.
"We finally started getting stops and that got our offense going," said Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, who played the entire second half. "We kept pushing and pushing, and things started to work."
That didn't mean it was over. Detroit only had a narrow lead, and Drummond needed a break. That meant Anthony going back to center and Prince coming in at power forward -- the same combination that Chicago had mauled in the second quarter.
Prince, though, rolled the clock back to his days as a defensive star, picking off two early passes and pulling down nine defensive rebounds in the fourth.
"Guys like Joel, Tayshaun and Caron (Butler) have been around for a long time, and they know how to adjust when that's what their team needs," Caldwell-Pope said. "What they did was huge."
Jackson also needed a breather at the start of the fourth, but Spencer Dinwiddie was ready. He had 10 points and six assists in the final 12 minutes as Detroit pulled away.
"We finally got into a rhythm, and sometimes, that's all a team needs," the rookie said. "You hit a couple shots in a row, and suddenly everything seems easy."
Anthony, Prince and Dinwiddie played so well down the stretch that they never came out of the game.
"Reggie had a phenomenal third quarter, and Spencer was so good that we didn't even put him back in the game," Van Gundy said. "We didn't bring Andre or Anthony back, either. The bench guys had it under control."
The only flaw? Anthony and Prince both had to play big second-half minutes with a game in Boston at 6 p.m. on Sunday.
"That was a great night," Van Gundy said. "I just wish we had more than 15 minutes before our next game."
