DETROIT — Over the past seven months, Donovan Mitchell made sure to remind every reporter he could that this season wasn’t the same as the previous.
“We got to let last year go,” Mitchell said back in November. “This is a whole different season. Everybody around us got better. It’s a different season. I think we have to drop this whole, ‘Well, last year was this.’ It’s not the same.”
That proved true for the Cleveland Cavaliers, in more ways than one.
Everything that seemingly could go right during the 2024-25 regular season did. They had three double-digit win streaks, won 41 games by 10 or more points, and didn’t face any adversity as they cruised to 64 wins.
Their good fortune reversed in the postseason. Injuries and an inability to close games led to them being a second-round exit in five games.
This regular season was the opposite.
The Cavs couldn’t establish any real momentum. Consistent injuries, underperforming role players, and two drastic trades led to 12 fewer wins. And far more ways for this team to fracture — except it didn’t.
“He kept this thing together,” head coach Kenny Atkinson said about Mitchell after the Game 7 win over the Detroit Pistons. “When things weren’t going great, he was the beacon, the light. His leadership carried us on the court.”
The Cavs never established any kind of rhythm or looked like a title-contending team throughout the season, but Mitchell’s steady hand on and off the court kept things on the rails. His consistent effort, seen mostly through his scoring, allowed the Cavs to tread water through turbulent times in the first half of the season. That bought the group time to figure out who they were.
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It’s not uncommon for a team that enters the year with championship aspirations to blow up before getting after the ground. Most recently, it was last season’s Philadelphia 76ers that fell flat due to injuries after trading for Paul George the summer before. The same could’ve happened in Cleveland.
Significant injuries to Darius Garland, Jarrett Allen, Sam Merrill, and Max Strus, coupled with disappointing seasons from De’Andre Hunter and Lonzo Ball, could’ve easily derailed this year.
Mitchell stepped up every time he needed to. This included putting up 35+ point nights to get past tanking teams like the Brooklyn Nets, Indiana Pacers, and Washington Wizards on a somewhat consistent basis. That isn’t ideal, but it allowed the Cavs to keep pace with the rest of the conference contenders.
For as good as he was on the court, it’s how he approached things off the court that allowed this team to keep going.
“When things weren’t going great, he was the person everyone looked to,” Atkinson said. “I would’ve said this if we lost. I was going to say the same thing. We could have splintered. If your leader splintered, if he goes another direction, which he very well could have, things weren’t going great. But he stayed positive, he supported the young guys, he never got down on the group. Kudos to him.”
That spirit was seen throughout the playoffs, even when things weren’t going his way.
Mitchell struggled in the final five games of the first round series against the Toronto Raptors. In the second round, his disappointing showing in Game 6 cost them their best chance to secure a spot in the conference finals. The flaws that have plagued him throughout his career were on full display.
Instead of doubling down on trying to pull the team over the finish line himself in Game 7, he trusted his teammates to get the job done. He hit the “singles” Atkinson has been asking him to look for all postseason and finished with eight assists. Three more than he’s had in any other playoff game this year.
“That’s huge,” Jarrett Allen said. “For the leading scorer of our team to come out with the mindset not to score the ball, but to get everybody else going. I think that really set the tone for the game for us offensively. Donovan knows he can get a bucket at any time. We all believe that. But he got everybody else going. He got me a quick six points. Everybody was scoring. Sam [Merrill] was scoring, Max [Strus] was getting [clean looks] all because Don was attacking downhill and distributing the ball.”
The perseverance that Mitchell has shown throughout the season, including the postseason, has now taken this team somewhere they haven’t been with this group. They’ve taken a meaningful step forward and are now four wins away from winning the conference, a feat this franchise hasn’t done without LeBron James.
That’s worth celebrating, even if they have eyes on more.
“Even last year, we lost to Indiana, we had our goals set on getting to the Finals,” Mitchell said. “And we’re one step closer, but it’s been almost a decade of running into the same issue. I personally, and as a team, we can breathe a little bit, but in the same token, we can only breathe for about 12 hours, and then get right back at it.”
Things won’t get any easier for the Cavs.
The New York Knicks have stood in this core’s way since the very beginning. Losing to them in the humiliating fashion that they did in 2023 has set the narrative for this core. They’ve done a lot to shake those preconceived notions over the last month. This isn’t the team that we saw last year or in any of the previous playoff runs.
However, if they’re going to rewrite history, they’ll need more star performances from Mitchell. Fortunately, he has a lot of practice coming up big for this group this year.
“It’s incredible,” Allen said of Mitchell’s leadership.
“I hope Don knows this. I’ll follow him into war. I’ll trust every single decision that he makes, every single shot that he takes, every single word that he speaks in the locker room. It speaks volumes to how he is as a person. He goes out there and does follow his own message.
“It’s easy for the team, easy for myself to follow somebody that goes out there and gives 110% no matter what and is a high-level character guy as well. That makes it easier for not only the guys who’ve been in the league who’ve seen guys who don’t lead in a certain way, but especially for the young guys as well, to follow that lead. It’s been incredible for him to keep us together during those times.”
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