Becoming A Contender is difficult business, filled with missteps, false starts, cul-de-sacs and distractions, and it is never more difficult than when a team that has been on power suck for most of the last decade and a half suddenly finds itself in other people’s late-season business.

Hence, the Detroit Pistons in this, the beginning of their latest renaissance, having to relearn everything here at the hinder end of the regular season. Since their last trip to the Eastern Conference Final in 2008, they have had the worst record in the NBA, their worst record in team history, the longest losing streak in league history, lost their last 12 playoff games, and in general been easy to dismiss—hence their persistent dismissal.

But they’re back this year, having carved out one of the greatest year-to-year improvements in NBA history and rebranding themselves as first rate shit-stirrers in a conference that can use all the televisual irritants it can get. They came into Minneapolis on Sunday to face the equally attitudinal Minnesota Timberwolves, and they are constantly spoiling for some respect until the playoffs when respect is actually earned.

So it comes as little surprise that this happened:

It’s just men at play until the play turns weird and then tempers flare and take it into Customer City. That might be the one thing Adam Silver still takes active umbrage at because, as a lawyer, he knows the smell of a lawsuit loosening up when its scent hits the wind.

Anyway, five players and two coaches were ejected for their roles in the grand distraction, and we say distraction because the Pistons led by 10, 39-29, when the twigs snapped. They were so thrown off their kicks that they let their lead slip to six by the quarter’s end and got out-and-out boatraced from there, eventually losing 123-104.

The loss didn’t really much matter. They’ve essentially locked in a playoff spot, and more specifically look likelier than ever to face Indiana in the first round, a winnable series even after allowing for the Pistons’ essential overachievement this year.

We won’t be adjudicating the fight because frankly it’s the end of March, people are cranky, and the playoffs are still three weeks away. Everybody is a little colicky right now. Just know that Isaiah Stewart and Ron Holland were among the seven ejectees, which you probably could have guessed even if neither the Pistons nor Timberwolves were involved. If there’s a problem anywhere in the NBA on any given night, assume Stewart and Holland first and then proceed.

All this said, there’s a lesson here for the Pistons and Timberwolves, and that is that searching to provide the entertainment dollar this late in the regular season is fraught with peril. Some teams are trying to win, others would rather get tertiary eczema than be caught trying, and everyone in general is sick of tanking and load management and contract bullshit and firing rumors. They want the real season to start, goddammit, and so they’re bound to have what we like to call “a bit of the arse.”

But it’s what you do after you’ve let your guard down that defines you, and last night the Wolves came off better than the Pistons. Detroit is currently on a brief roadie that takes them to Oklahoma City (oh god) and Toronto (the gods even up the odds) before heading back home to prep for a postseason that either starts in Manhattan or Indianapolis, so we’ll get a sense of how ready they are for the real season in the next few days. If they can slough off this little hissy fit, they can be taken as serious players in the easily morphable East, while the Timberwolves will be punching uphill the entire time in the postseason.

In other words, at least everyone had a hoot last night, which sure beats what happened to the Bucks or Spurs. Losing at home to the freaking Atlanta Hawks or eating it by 42 at home to Golden State and not punching someone in a fit of indulgent pique is no way to go through life, son, to paraphrase the sainted Dean Vernon Wormer. You gots to do what gets you through the night, Pookie.