Cade Cunningham called for more from the Detroit Pistons even after they matched their franchise record of 13 straight wins, but their former coach Rick Carlisle feels the team are genuine contenders.

Cunningham had 24 points, 11 rebounds and six assists, while Caris LeVert added 19 points off the bench, as Detroit beat the Indiana Pacers 122-117 at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.

They are now 15-2 for the season, boasting the best record in the Eastern Conference, while their 13-game winning streak is the joint-longest in their history.

Only the Pistons teams of 1990 and 2004 – both of whom went on to win the NBA Championship in those campaigns – had previously won 13 in a row.

Detroit's current class will now have a chance to claim the record outright against the Boston Celtics on Wednesday, but Cunningham was in no mood to celebrate.

Indiana trailed by 19 points at one point in Monday's game but then cut Detroit's lead to as few as three points, leading Cunningham to call for greater concentration.

"It's not like I've been saying, 'I need to get the best winning streak in Pistons history.' None of us have been thinking like that," Cunningham said.

"We just want to be our best version of ourselves, and tonight was not the best version of us, so I'm not happy about that."

Head coach J.B. Bickerstaff concurred, saying Detroit needed to maintain their defensive focus down the stretch.

"I would like for us to be greedier. I felt like in that fourth quarter, and even in the third quarter, we let our guard down defensively," he said. 

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"We allowed them to make a run. And again, I'll keep saying it, our defense is our identity. That's when we're at our best.

"That second half, we weren't our best defensively. That's the mindset that we have to have. The mindset has to be that we can't ever feel full or satisfied."

But Indiana coach Carlisle, who coached the Pistons for the two seasons preceding their 2004 title win, is certain Detroit are the real deal. 

"This team has been built in a similar mode to the Bad Boy Pistons and then the Pistons of my era," Carlisle said. 

"Physicality, toughness, depth... they're a mirror image of the personality of the city. 

"Now they've got a great coach with J.B. and a great staff there. They're making a pretty clear statement that they're for real."