Pistons Rocks Nuggets

Detroit Pistons All-Star Jerry Stackhouse turned on the fireworks for new head coach George Irvine's first game.

Stackhouse, who had never made more than three 3-pointers in an NBA game, hit six Wednesday night on his way to a career-high 40 points in Detroit's 130-116 victory over the Denver Nuggets.

"We really wanted to play well for George tonight this is where we need to turn our season around," Stackhouse said. "But the most important thing was to get this one for ourselves."

"I'm not sure we want Stack taking 10 3-pointers every night. That's about a week's worth for him normally," Irvine said. "But he was feeling it tonight."

Grant Hill added 27 points and 10 assists, while Mikki Moore set career bests with 15 points and eight rebounds.

Irvine replaced Alvin Gentry, who was fired on Monday. Irvine, who has already said he doesn't want the job permanently, is expected to coach the rest of this season.

"Tonight, I love this job. There's no better feeling in the world than being the head coach of a team that plays well," he said. "But tomorrow I'll be back to hating it."

Denver also finished the game with a temporary coach as John Lucas took over after Dan Issel was ejected in the third quarter.

"I didn't think I deserved the second T. I didn't swear. I just told them they were losing control of the game," Issel said. "We played a good half, but they got a great lift from their bench in the second half with (Jerome) Williams and Moore."

Stackhouse went 13 of 21 from the floor, including six 3-pointers, and hit all eight free-throw attempts in 34 minutes.

" was taking all my threes from the corner. They are a lot shorter that way," he said. "Shooting from out there is nice, too. You don't get banged around nearly as much as when you drive."

Antonio McDyess led the Nuggets with 29 points and Nick Van Exel added 19. Van Exel, though, didn't score after intermission.

"In the second half, they just came out and took the ball out of my hands," Van Exel said. "That was the biggest difference. In the first half, we ran our offense, but in the second they caused a lot of havoc."

The Pistons reached 130 points for the second time in two weeks. Before their 131-99 win over Golden State on Feb. 25, they hadn't done it since 1990.

Denver jumped out to an 11-point lead in the first quarter and still led 66-63 at intermission.

Detroit started the third period with a 14-2 run to take their first lead of the night. Stackhouse had 5 points in the run, which was helped by five Denver turnovers.

The Pistons outscored Denver 41-17 to take a 104-83 lead into the final period. Stackhouse had 10 points in the period as the Pistons shot 72 percent (13-18) from the floor and added 11 free throws.

"We screwed up our defensive scheme in the first half, but we fixed it at the half," Irvine said. "Once we did that, they were great. This is a player's league. If you give them the right system, they will do their job."

Detroit led by as many as 26 points in the fourth.

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