The Miami Heat had one of the roughest road schedules in the league before the All-Star break.
Saturday night, the Heat took advantage of a team going through one of those stretches themselves, beating the wary Detroit Pistons 105-96 at AmericanAirlines Arena in a pivotal showdown in the Eastern Conference playoff race.
Despite 31 points and six assists from Blake Griffin and 22 points and 18 rebounds from All-Star center Andre Drummond, the Pistons, playing on the second night of a back-to-back and for the fifth time in seven days, shot 41.6 percent and turned it over 18 times (it led to 26 points for Miami).