The Detroit Pistons have done it again. After staring elimination in the face, J.B. Bickerstaff's group ran the Cleveland Cavaliers off Little Caesars Arena 115-94 in Game 6, outscoring the one-seed 61-43 in the second half and locking down a Game 7 in Detroit on Sunday night. At the centre of it all, as he has been for two months, was Cade Cunningham, who took the podium afterwards looking less like a player coming off a collapsed lung last month and more like a star daring his team to follow him.
"I feel great. I'm excited. I still got a lot of adrenaline in me, so I feel great. I'm ready to go," Cunningham said, when asked how his body was holding up after another heavy minutes night against Cleveland.
The numbers behind the result were brutal for Cleveland. Detroit shot 52% from the field, finished plus-12 from three, posted eight more points off turnovers and seven more second-chance points. The bench delivered 48 points, a 29-point edge over Cleveland's reserves, and Cunningham wanted to talk about everyone but himself.
"It was great. We needed every bit of it," he said. "Sasser was amazing. Bogdanovic obviously did it again, had another great game. Burks been great all series. It's been a collective effort, having Dunk come back, he made some huge shots for us. So it's been a collective effort. We needed every bit of it. Great team win."
The Pistons leaned hard on a four-guard set in stretches, particularly when Cleveland tried to muscle Donovan Mitchell to the rim. Cunningham described it as a defensive weapon as much as an offensive one.
"We got four playmakers out there. We finally have started to get some synergy with it," he said. "We kind of know what we're trying to get to and stuff like that. And I think it's been solid defensively, being able to switch and guard everything. It's about rebounding the ball, and I thought we did a pretty good job of that tonight."
The story behind the story was Cleveland's offence falling off a cliff. Detroit held the Cavs to 29% shooting in the second half, a number Cunningham attributed to will more than scheme.
"You know just our will," he said. "Executing the game plan obviously, but just our will, our aggression, getting into the ball, not wanting to lose. I mean, they got good players over there. They got guys that can really make plays. So it takes a lot of effort to guard them. It takes all five guys to guard them. And I thought we did a really good job."
Cunningham, who has now shot 43% from three in the postseason after sitting at 35% during the regular season, was asked what had changed.
"Just letting it fly, trusting my work, being really intentional with how I warm up and going into each shot, making sure I give it a good chance," he said. "So it's opened up a lot. Obviously having guys have to really respect it, fly out at me, I want to get to the rim, I want to get to the mid-range. But being able to shoot the three obviously just adds more layers to my game."
The reward for the Pistons is the second Game 7 of their playoff run, after rallying from 3-1 down against Orlando in the first round. The reward for Cunningham is another night in front of a Detroit crowd that has not seen its team in a conference final since 1991.
"It's going to be a lot of energy. It's going to be a madhouse in there," Cunningham said. "The crowd is going to come to play as well. They want to insert themselves in the game, I know that. So it's going to be a fun environment for us, and we're excited to get back to the crib."
The winner gets the New York Knicks. The loser goes home for the summer.
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*Originally published on [NBA News Global](https://nbanews.global/article/cade-cunningham-pistons-cavs-game-7-collapsed-lung-postgame-may-2026). Visit for full coverage.*
