There was already enough tension in a big-time matchup between the Detroit Pistons and a surging Charlotte Hornets team Monday night before a [brawl in the third quarter saw four players ejected](https://www.mlive.com/pistons/2026/02/fight-breaks-out-in-pistons-hornets-game-leading-to-4-ejections.html) from the game.
What started as a physical foul from Moussa Diabate on Detroit’s Jalen Duren quickly descended into chaos and saw benches clear to separate the two players.
Duren shoved Diabate after they went face-to-face, leading to Diabate trying to chase down Duren to deliver a punch. Diabate had to be held back multiple times as he attempted to get to the Detroit center.
Things spilled back onto the Spectrum Center court as Charlotte’s Miles Bridges tried to punch Duren, leading to the Pistons’ Isaiah Stewart rushing in from the bench and clashing with Bridges.
In the end, Duren, Stewart, Diabate and Bridges were all ejected from the matchup due to “fighting activity” crew chief John Goble said in a postgame pool report.
Following the game, [which Detroit won 110-104](https://www.mlive.com/pistons/2026/02/pistons-end-hornets-9-game-win-streak-after-chaotic-brawl.html), coach J.B. Bickerstaff defended his players and their involvement in the ruckus.
“Our guys deal with a lot, but they’re not the ones that initiated, they’re not the ones that crossed the line tonight,” Bickerstaff said. “It was clear through frustration because of what (Duren) was doing that they crossed the line. I hate that it got as ugly as it got. That’s not something you ever want to see, but if a guy throws a punch at you, you have a responsibility to protect yourself and that’s what happened tonight...our guy had to defend himself.”
Guard Cade Cunningham said he didn’t get the best viewpoint of the full incident while he was on the court, but he believed Duren was just “trying to defend himself” as well.
Charlotte coach Charles Lee didn’t have much to say about the altercation.
He would be ejected in the fourth quarter after arguing an offensive foul call against the Hornets, which he took ownership for after the game.
“I’ll have to go back and watch it again, just looked like physicality and two guys got in a heated conversation and then it just spiraled from there,” Lee said.
Charlotte forward Brandon Miller, who was on the court at the time, added “emotions are high, so sometimes things escalate like that.”
Bickerstaff also expressed his frustration that it seems likely the players could be handed down further punishment from the NBA. He particularly hates that prospect for Stewart, who he believed was just backing up his teammate.
“We don’t want to see it get to that point, but when you go back and watch the film, they ran multiple guys at (Duren),” Bickerstaff said. “(Duren) and (Stewart) consider themselves to be brothers. And if you run two guys at one guy and you’ve already crossed the line, human instincts says to protect his little brother.”
Duren believes the Pistons have dealt with teams bringing more aggression to their matchups this season and thinks as a group they’ve typically done a good job staying level-headed.
He says that comes with added physicality or players talking at them more, but once emotions got too high, things boiled over.
“Just an overly competitive game, emotions flaring,” Duren said postgame. “At the end of the day we would love to keep it basketball, but things happen. Everybody is just playing hard.”
In the wake of the ejections, the Pistons had a big showing from reserve big man Paul Reed, who played nearly the entire rest of the game.
He scored 12 points, adding two steals and two blocks as part of the winning effort. Even though Reed said he wanted to be there to back his teammate, he knew it was important no more players get tossed in a crucial matchup.
“I’m pretty sure that everybody wanted to help (Duren) out there, even the guys on the bench,” Reed told the Pistons’ television broadcast. “We’ve got each other’s back 100,000% but we’ve gotta play basketball and win a game so we can’t all just crash out. Somebody’s got to stay poised, stay in the moment, understand what’s at stake.”
The Pistons came away with the road win and have just one more game before the All-Star break, but the big question is whether Duren and Stewart will face suspension.
Stewart has quite a track record of fights going back to a November 2021 brawl with LeBron James, a three-game suspension for punching Drew Eubanks in 2024 and a pair of suspensions last season following incidents against the Indiana Pacers and Minnesota Timberwolves.
That could mean his punishment ends up being harsher than Duren’s, but the Pistons will hope not to be without their key bigs for too long.