Cavs’ Donovan Mitchell through to conference finals for first time

Donovan Mitchell goes home after Round 2 of the playoffs again.

This time, it’s a superb thing.

Mitchell’s breakthrough moment has arrived. He’s going to the conference finals for the primary time in his profession. And that series will begin at Madison Square Garden, a bonus for the native Latest Yorker.

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Nothing higher than celebrating together with your fiancée after the Game 7 win 🥹💯@TheRealCocoJ x @spidadmitchell pic.twitter.com/4Ua1ndIKII

— NBA (@NBA) May 18, 2026

In his ninth season, Mitchell has reached the NBA’s final 4. He and the Cleveland Cavaliers rolled past the Detroit Pistons 125-94 on Sunday night in Game 7 — on the road, no less — of their Eastern Conference semifinal series. Their reward is a visit to Latest York for Game 1 of the East finals against the Knicks on Tuesday.

“Me and my fiancee joked that we were going home regardless, so we’d as well play some basketball while we’re on the crib,” Mitchell said. “It’s going to be special, needless to say.”

Mitchell had 26 points, seven rebounds and eight assists in Sunday’s romp. And when his night was over with 4:01 remaining, he had handshakes and hugs for anyone wearing Cleveland colours. He leaned right down to wrap his arms around a seated Cavs coach Kenny Atkinson, who said before the sport that he wanted Mitchell to be himself in Game 7.

The result?

“It was higher than Donovan Mitchell,” Atkinson said. “Is that possible? … It began with him, his defense, rebounding, after which when he gets within the paint and starts making other people higher, you recognize, the dishes, dish-offs to our big guys, that was the important thing, I felt like, to the sport. He had complete control of the sport.”

READ: NBA Playoffs: Cavaliers crush Pistons in Game 7, advance vs Knicks

Mitchell was delivered to Cleveland in September 2022 in a trade with Utah, with the Cavaliers betting — appropriately, it turned out — that he could be the last piece of their post-LeBron James rebuild and help them return to the playoffs.

They got to the primary round in 2023, then lost within the second round in 2024 and 2025. This 12 months, the conference finals await after the third-biggest road win a team has ever had in a Game 7.

“I’ll follow him into war,” Cavs forward Jarrett Allen said.

Mitchell has been an All-Star in each of the last seven seasons, was one in all eight players to receive a minimum of one vote on this 12 months’s MVP balloting and can likely be an All-NBA pick for the third time.

But there was a void — the deep playoff run.

Not anymore.

“Couldn’t be happier for him, to make that next step,” Atkinson said. “He’s going home to Latest York. He kept this thing together this 12 months when things weren’t going great. He was the beacon, the sunshine … he carried us on the court.”

Added the Cavs’ Sam Merrill, who grew up in Utah and was a Jazz fan when Mitchell was there: “You’re not going to search out a man more completely satisfied for him than I’m. But I do know he wants more. All of us want more.”

There have been so many near-misses for Mitchell along the best way. Mitchell’s Utah team wasted a 3-1 lead within the 2020 playoff bubble against Denver within the West semifinals, falling in seven games. A 12 months later, the Jazz were up 2-0 in Round 2 against the Los Angeles Clippers, who ended up winning in six. He got hurt in Round 2 against Boston as that series fell apart for Cleveland in 2024, and last 12 months the Cavaliers went 0-3 at home within the second round against Indiana on the approach to a five-game ouster.

He was a part of a No. 1 seed in 2021, a part of a No. 1 seed again last 12 months, and never got out of Round 2.

Until now.

“We will’t really have a look at it and say, ‘All right, we did it, we got to the conference finals,’” Mitchell said. “Hey, man, that’s not the end-all. We’ve still got more to do.”