AUBURN HILLS -- Tayshaun Prince rarely softens his public position on where the Detroit Pistons stand at any given time, and after their latest home loss, the veteran forward pointed the finger at the end of the floor upon which the Pistons, by design, are supposedly centrally focused.

Prince called it a "growing trend" that when the Pistons get a lead, they lose their defensive focus, like in Tuesday's 104-97 loss to the Denver Nuggets.

"It's just been the same trend that's been happening," Prince said. "Just giving away games like this, it's not pleasing to the fans, it's not pleasing to us."

The biggest issue, Prince said, is that the Pistons don't consistently adhere to their own defense-first philosophy, like when the Nuggets shot 27.3 percent in the first quarter, then 53.4 over the last three quarters.

"And it's been like that this season so far," Prince said. "The teams that we've been up on early in the first half, we get really comfortable with what we're doing offensively, then from a defensive standpoint, the discipline ends up going away because we've got it going so good on the offensive end."

So it was in a second-quarter dunk-fest by the Nuggets, who had six of their 10 slams in that period to reverse a 21-4 deficit and take the lead before halftime.

It marked the eighth time the Pistons (7-17) lost a game they led by double digits, and their seventh loss by seven points or less.

"We had Denver turning the ball over, taking some shots they didn't want to take at the beginning, and that kind of got us going, got some dunks and things like that," Prince said.

Soon after, the breakdowns began.

Prince pointed to Jason Maxiell, who equaled a career-high with six blocked shots, as a teammate unfairly victimized by poor team defense.

Exhibit A was Danilo Gallinari's 3-pointer to push Denver's lead to 96-89, effectively ending the game, when Brandon Knight got switched onto the taller player then tried to switch back with Maxiell while the Nuggets' power forward was teeing up a decisive blow.

"Max had a terrific game on both ends, especially on the defensive end, but a couple of bad things happened where his man scored and everybody's looking at Max like, 'What happened?'" Prince said. "No, it's not Max's fault. But that's just the things that happen when all five guys aren't on the same page. That's where the discipline factor comes in."

Pistons coach Lawrence Frank said his team's defensive communication began to wane in the second quarter, which contributed to Gallinari's big shot, as well as the combined 37 points and 14 assists for Denver guard duo Ty Lawson and Andre Miller, who were "very much in control of the game," Frank said.

"There are no excuses," Frank said. "To me, we're not going to bring in (motivational speaker) Tony Robbins and wave some incense. Look, these are grown men. We've just got to play better. I'm not here to look for excuses or give excuses. ... We just have to play better. I have to coach better. It's that simple."

Kyle Singler played on a national championship team at Duke, where he lost 23 games in four years. He is six away from that total after just six weeks in the NBA.

"You've got to stay positive," Singler said. "There's going to be tough times wherever you go sometimes. Everything in my life hasn't been perfect. Losing like this is tough. But it shows who you are and if you're willing to change and put forth the necessary work to get better.

"I know that losing is tough for this team. I see it every day."

Prince said everyone in the Pistons' locker room is frustrated. But at least he thinks he knows why it's happening, and it isn't that the Pistons have played 24 games -- two more than the next-most by any NBA team -- or four in the last five days.

"We've played a lot of games in the last two weeks," he said. "People use fatigue as a factor and things like that. But the way we came out today in the first half, at the beginning of the game, you didn't see fatigue. So it can't be that. Not today. Because the energy was there from the beginning of the game.

"Was there some fatigue factor in some of the previous few games? Yeah, there was. Was there some tonight? There could've been in stretches, but the way we started off the game, we had enough energy to be able to sustain it. But just the discipline factor just wasn't there."

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