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DETROIT — One game changes everything.
Judgment day has been delayed as the Cleveland Cavaliers ran the Detroit Pistons out of their own building in a lopsided 125-95 Game 7 victory.
For the first time since 2018, the Cavs are heading to the Eastern Conference Finals.
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The Cavaliers went all-in on this core when they traded Darius Garland — who admitted after the season that his toe still wasn’t right — for a decade-older James Harden. It’s too early to say the gamble has completely paid off. We can at least say they’ve reached the minimum for this season not to be labeled a disaster.
This team took a step forward this postseason.
Going into training camp, head coach Kenny Atkinson wrote 11-15 on a whiteboard. That was the Cavs’ postseason record in the previous three seasons.
The current version that won tonight was comprised mostly of the same players as those previous teams, but this group is different.
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They faced adversity and responded in a way that we simply haven’t seen before. After falling behind 0-2 against a 60-win team, they strung together three impressive victories that showcased different skills. And then, after a demoralizing Game 6 loss that was all too reminiscent of previous postseason collapses, they responded with a win that showed that this team is, in fact, not the same.
That difference starts with their star player.
“It’s been almost a decade of running into the same issue,” Donovan Mitchell said after Game 7 when asked what it means to get to the conference finals. Some of those issues were self-inflicted. Some weren’t.
Before the game, Kenny Atkinson said that Mitchell being more of a playmaker has been an emphasis this postseason, even though this hasn’t come to fruition yet. He wanted Mitchell to “hit singles” and make the easy pass.
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Mitchell did that. He picked up three helpers in the first three minutes of the game by easily reading where the help defense was coming from and then making the pass to the open man.
When he’s doing that, the game opens up for him and everyone else — especially the bigs.
Atkinson had dinner…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/9-takeaways-cavs-dominate-game-050147699.html
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Publish date : 2026-05-18 05:01:00
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