Cade Cunningham drops 45 points to power Pistons past Magic in Game 5, avoid elimination

Cade Cunningham and the Detroit Pistons aren’t giving up just yet. Cunningham went off in a historic battle with Paolo Banchero on Wednesday night to keep the Pistons alive this spring. Cunningham dropped 45 points to lead them to a 116-109 win over the Orlando Magic in Game 5 of their opening-round playoff series.

That cut the Magic’s lead in the series to 3-2 and forced a Game 6 later this week back in Florida. Cunningham shot 13-of-23 from the floor and 5-of-8 from behind the arc while picking up his 45 points, which set a new Pistons single-game playoff record. That passed a mark set by Dave Bing back in 1968.

While the Pistons are still in a dangerous position after falling into a 3-1 hole to the No. 8 seed in the Eastern Conference, their postseason hopes aren’t gone just yet. Cunningham takes off in second quarter The Pistons tried to take control of the game early, and nearly ran away with it.

To their credit, their offense looked better than it has the entire series. Detroit put up 66 points in the first half behind 27 from Cunningham, who went 8-of-14 from the field and had 20 in the second quarter alone. His 27 points marked the highest scoring postseason half by a Pistons player in the play-by-play era.