Andre Drummond is a beast. He's 6'11", 280 pounds, and is having a career season, averaging 17 points and 15 rebounds per game. Those are monster numbers for the first time all-star who also happens to have his Pistons sniffing the playoffs for the first time in years, and he's only 22. Lest you think words like "beast" and "monster" indicate that he's a scary dude, Andre also just won February's NBA Cares Community Assist Award for the great work he's done with the Special Olympics ("Man, it's amazing!" he says). We sat down with the big guy and just like on the court (free throw line excepted) he was pretty great.

You guys are in the playoff hunt—currently in the eighth spot—how are you guys feeling going down the home stretch? Are you scoreboard watching yet?

You know for us, we try to take it a day at a time. A game at a time. A practice at a time. We don't really want to look too far ahead and put a lot of pressure on ourselves because this is huge. For a lot of guys on our team, they've never been in this situation where they have a chance to play for the playoffs. Myself included! I mean I've watched the playoffs my whole life obviously, but to be in the hunt for it is an incredible feeling. So I'm really looking forward to trying to get in there.

That's interesting. How is the day-to-day different now that you guys are in the hunt, versus how things were in previous years where rebuilding was the focus?

Honestly? [Laughs] Everybody's on edge right now! Including myself. Because it's right there. It's right there for the taking and we all are starting to understand that. Every game. Every possession. Every turnover. Every missed shot. Every thing we mess up can really come back and bite us now. So we're really trying to just figure out ways to get through it. And we're picking the guys' brains who have been in this situation it to see what it takes to get to the playoffs. We're just learning a lot right now.

Yeah, and it seems like you guys are getting pumped up in a way that you don't see from teams who aren't in the hunt. You had that amazing tip-in the other night against Milwaukee and the guys were just going nuts. It almost seemed like a playoff vibe.

Yeah, like that game felt like a college game. It felt like I had just made a basket to go to the Final Four. [laughs] So, it was an incredible basket that I tipped in, and the celebration that my teammates and I had that we really needed that win to put us ahead a little bit was incredible. Because now we're in that eight spot. But we have ten more games to go, so we have a lot more to play for and a lot more to prove, and we're excited for it.