They weren’t going to survive overtime. Not after that. Not after giving up a nine-point lead with three minutes left in the game, and a 3-2 series lead there for the taking.
They had this game. Took this game. Then booted this game, with one brutal missed opportunity after another.
All they needed was a stop, or a single bucket, and the Detroit Pistons were off to Cleveland for Game 6 on Friday, May 15, needing just one of the next two for a trip to their first Eastern Conference finals since 2008.
Now they’ll have to flush one of the worst collapses in recent Detroit sports memory. Technically, I suppose, they can still make that happen. Find a way in Cleveland in Game 6. Shake off the road malaise they’ve shown all postseason and find a way to bring this back to Detroit for a Game 7.
But after losing this way? With the game just … about … over? After they’d come back from another poor third quarter, from more foul and free throw disparity? From losing Duncan Robinson before the game? From having lost – again – their promising young center during the game? (If anyone has seen Jalen Duren, let him know what happened Wednesday night at Little Caesars Arena).
Yeah, no. They weren’t coming back from that. That’s not how overtime works in the NBA. It was Cleveland’s game at that point. And the Cavs happily grabbed the gift, beating the Pistons, 117-113.
Momentum is real like that. Too real.
Again, now what?
Well, they’ll say all the right things, and they’ll do their best to bring the competitive spirit they showed Wednesday night, spirt that they didn’t show in Game 4, or very much of in Game 3, both in Cleveland. Maybe that’ll give them a chance. Keep them around.
But then what happens if the game is close there? And Cleveland starts doubling Cade Cunningham again?
Because that’s what swung the game late, when the Cavaliers forced the Pistons’ superstar to give up the ball. He’d been magnificent most of the night. Scored 37 in regulation.
It wasn’t enough.
Not when no one else could make that one last play. Not when it counted. Not with the season on the line.
That was always the worry, right?
Oh, for a while it looked like there was enough elsewhere. Paul Reed helped turn the game again, at one point blocking James Harden at the rim, securing the rebound, tossing it ahead to Tobias Harris, who pushed it and took the defense into the lane with him before kicking it to Daniss Jenkins in the corner.
Jenkins took the pass, gathered himself, rose up, and let it fly, square and true.
Splash.
Timeout.
They were cooking, and defending, and had finally found some offensive-defensive balance in the lineup:
Harris, Jenkins, Reed, Cunningham, Ausar Thompson.
Thompson, meanwhile, returned to wrecking-ball form, blocking jump shots, stealing the ball, hounding Donovan Mitchell into a 7-for-18 night. He was everywhere – again.
He needed to be. They all did. They’d lost their way after another poor third quarter, getting bullied on the glass, getting lost in the muck offensively, falling for Harden’s foul-baiting.
Twice, the former league MVP drew fouls behind the 3-point line. The first stopped all the Pistons’ momentum in the second quarter, when they led by 15. Harden went on a mini-run all by himself, and by the time the half had ended, Detroit led by merely eight.
That disappeared quickly in the third quarter. The Pistons didn’t help by overhelping in the gaps and leaving Cleveland’s shooters open.
They gave up five 3-pointers in the quarter and 32 points, flipping their eight-point lead into a four-point deficit headed into the fourth.
Then coach J.B. Bickerstaff found that lineup anchored by Cunningham and Reed, and they re-grabbed hold of the game and just about had it locked away.
All they needed was one more play. They couldn’t make it. Cleveland did.
How in the world do they recover from this?
Contact Shawn Windsor: swindsor@freepress.com. Follow him @shawnwindsor.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Pistons must forget one of the worst collapses in Detroit sports history
Reporting by Shawn Windsor, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
