A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing, especially in sports.

Witness yesterday’s basketball game between the Philadelphia Seventy-Sixers and the Detroit Pistons. On paper this should have been no contest. The Pistons won 59 games this year, giving them the third best record in the NBA. They have three all-star players compared to Philadelphia’s none and more playoff experience than just about any other team in the league, especially a team as young as the Sixers.

And all that experience was on display for the first three quarters of yesterday’s game. But with 6:05 left in the third quarter, the Sixers started to rally. And never stopped.

Erasing a 15 point deficit—a near Herculean comeback against a team that plays defense as well as Detroit—the Sixers rose to a 90-86 victory, destroying the Piston’s home court advantage and stunning much of the basketball world in the process.

Afterwards, the buzz round the league centered around one idea: the Piston’s bad habit of playing down to their opponents.

Everyone familiar with sport is familiar with the phenomena. When a great team plays a great team the result is often, well, greatness (the best example of this being this weekend’s double overtime contest between the Suns and the Spurs). But put a fabulous squad on the court against mediocrity (the Sixers finished the season two games below 500) and the results are often disastrous.

So what the hell’s going on here?

According to Temple University sports psychologist Michael Sachs (a Philly fan no less), the party line is that “a team as good as the Pistons, particularly one that’s older and more experienced, gets a comfortable lead and then figures: 1) it can coast to victory and 2) the other team should have enough 'sense' to give up.”

Alas, as Sachs also points out, “the Sixers are too young to realize this and kept fighting back. The playing down to your opponent piece is playing at a level just above how one's opponent does, 'secure' in the knowledge one can beat him/her. Of course, occasionally this security is misplaced and one loses.”

The problem here is one that’s common in all sports: over-thinking.

Focusing on the score or the fact that one should win the game often trumps a player’s intuitive response patterns (so-called muscle memory) that allows them to just play their game. The minute they begin playing someone else’s game is the minute that they’ll begin to lose.

The moral of the story is don’t think, just play. Of course, like most morals, this one is often easier in theory than practice.