Described as the worst night in the NBA, the night of Malice at the Palace took a toll on the league. This night was one of the more unforgettable moments, and also a very important one as well. On this fateful night, November 19, 2004, a huge brawl took place between the Detroit Pistons and the Indiana Pacers. This took place in the Palace of Auburn Hills, Michigan - the Detroit Pistons home court.
The game played out like any other typical NBA game. No one tried anything and no harm and threat between the two teams were showed. However, towards the final minute of the game, the brawl began with 45.9 seconds remaining in the game. Pistons center Ben Wallace was fouled from behind by Pacers small forward Ron Artest. The foul was as is because Wallace was slapped across the back of the head during a layup attempt. Wallace has later warned Artest that he would be hit. Wallace took everything the wrong way and shoved Artest with both hands. This caused players from both teams to get in between the two as quickly as possible.
All of a sudden, tension occurred. As everyone was trying to clear off heat from the fight, Artest just laid on the scorer's table. It was at this moment when one of the fans threw a cup with liquid in it at Artest. Tension grew even stronger as Artest proceeded to go after whoever threw the cup. He entered the stands where all the fans were and went to go beat up the fan. He went after the wrong person. After fans grew a bunch of tension and considering a player from the opposing team was going after a fan of the Detroit Pistons, many other fans added to the tension and went after Artest. all of a sudden a big brawl between players and fans began. More and more of the security, staff, and players entered the stands to try their absolute hardest to end the madness. Fans were the ones who grew the angriest. Punch after punch, fighting proceeded and escalated.
As they were giving all effort to get the players out of the stands, the fans only grew even wilder. As players were barely starting to walk off the court, the fans began to throw food, drinks, and maybe even glass. Security had to cover the heads of the players as they made their way back to the locker room. It was described as the scariest night in NBA history. Many have said that no matter how bad it looked on TV, it was 20x worse in person. The league then had to make many rule changes for safety purposes, specifically to avoid traumatizing nights like this. This was a turning point where the NBA got softer in my opinion. One thing is for certain, Mallace at the Palace was a very eventful and historical moment.
