Donovan Mitchell turned Game 4 into his own second-half surge Monday night, pouring in 43 points and carrying the Cavs past the Pistons 112-103 to even the Eastern Conference Semifinals at 2-2.
Mitchell had 39 of those points after halftime, the kind of burst that changed the game before Detroit could settle back in. Noah Eagle called it “a complete Spida explosion” as the Cavaliers pulled away, and Grant Hill summed up the night afterward by saying, “It was a pleasure to witness greatness.”
Caris LeVert led Detroit with 24 points, while Cade Cunningham finished with 19. The Pistons stayed within reach for stretches, but Cleveland kept finding a response when the game tightened, and Mitchell provided most of it.
Mitchell said after the game, “I tried to make a statement in the second half,” and he did exactly that. The Cavaliers needed every bit of it in Game 4, because a series that had started to tilt now heads back to Detroit level again, with neither team able to take command through four games.
The matchup sits inside the 2026 NBA Playoffs and has become the kind of series that can turn on one star’s run, one quarter, one stop. Cleveland got that run Monday. Detroit gets the next shot at home.
For the Cavs, the result was more than a win. It was a reminder that when Mitchell gets rolling, the series can change in a hurry.
