Pistons coach John Kuester said he was unsure, when asked if forward Tayshaun Prince would be available for Thursday's game at Dallas. Prince suffered a cut on the bottom of his toe against Washington Tuesday night when he was kicked in the foot by the Wizards JaVale McGee.

“Arnie will give me more of an update, but what an unusual injury,” said Kuester, who even joked that he thought someone must have been wearing steel-toe boots. “I thought we were in a James Bond movie. When I saw the blood I went, ‘My gosh, what happened.’ He’s going to be all right, but it’s an unusual place to have a cut.”

Upon further review
Kuester saw things that he liked and didn’t like after reviewing the tape of Tuesday’s loss to the Wizards, the Pistons first loss of the preseason.

“I thought we had stretches where we were outstanding,” Kuester said. “Stretches where we need to continue to work on our rotations. Overall, I was pleased. I wasn’t happy we gave up so many points because they shot 46 percent from the field. That’s something that we got to constantly preach. We gave up too many easy opportunities for them. Another work in progress day. Guys kept working and working, we had some slippage, but we’ll work on that.”

The Pistons play at Dallas on Thursday, the first road game for the team in the preseason. Kuester said he looks forward to another challenge and his team is prepared to face a high-octane Mavericks team.

“Each game is now is starting to get challenging. So that’s one of the things we look forward to, facing a team that (presents) a lot of challenges as Washington did,” Kuester said. “We are looking forward to a different part of the journey. This week is like an NBA week and that’s what we’re approaching it as. We got to start giving other people opportunities. I’m playing a lot of different combinations, as you can tell. But in the same token, I have a lot of faith in all the people we’re playing.”

Jerebko impressing Kuester
To see my story on Jonas Jerebko in The Oakland Press, click here.