Pistons stop San Antonio, sweep season

The Detroit Pistons returned to the site of their most painful defeat and handed the defending NBA champions another lopsided loss.

Rasheed Wallace scored 27 points and had 10 rebounds to lead Detroit to an 83-68 win Thursday night over the Spurs in the Pistons’ first visit to San Antonio since losing Game 7 of the NBA finals last June.

Detroit dominated from the start of the game between the teams with the league’s two best records. The Pistons, 28-5, used sharp shooting and stingy defense to build a 20-point lead in the first half before the Spurs could get anything going.

“We knew it was going to be a fun one,” said Detroit point guard Chauncey Billups, who finished with 14 assists. “I personally wanted to get ‘Sheed’ aggressive. When our big men are aggressive, we get buckets in the paint. We’re just really difficult to play.”

The win gave Detroit a sweep of the season series between the teams. The Pistons won at home 85-70 on Christmas.

Lakers 99, Cavaliers 98: At Los Angeles, Kobe Bryant scored six of his 27 points in the final 90 seconds including the go-ahead basket with 8.6 seconds left, and Los Angeles beat LeBron James (28 points) and Cleveland.

Suns 112, Warriors 99: At Phoenix, Steve Nash had 20 points and 16 assists and Phoenix won for the eighth time in 10 games, leading from the opening basket in a victory over Golden State.

Off the court

Although Ray Allen regrets getting into a fight with Orlando’s Keyon Dooling on Wednesday, the Seattle SuperSonics guard said he had to defend himself. “I definitely regret what happened … but it seemed as though it was unavoidable,” Allen said. “It was almost like I was attacked and, you know, I responded in a way that I think any individual, any man or woman, would respond.” … Steve Francis was suspended indefinitely by Orlando for what the club said was “conduct detrimental to the team.” The team will have no further comment on the specifics of the suspension, Magic spokesman Joel Glass said.