DETROIT — Cade Cunningham scored a franchise playoff-record 45 points, including a step-back jumper with 32 seconds left, and the top-seeded Detroit Pistons beat the eighth-seeded Orlando Magic 116-109 on Wednesday night in Game 5 of their first-round series to stave off elimination.
Orlando leads the series 3-2 and will get a second chance to advance at home on Friday night.
The Magic fell to 0-10 in franchise history on the road in a Game 5.
Detroit never trailed and went ahead by 15 early in the final quarter.
The Magic made one more run, pulling within three points on Paolo Banchero’s sixth 3-pointer with 1:09 left.
Banchero matched Cunningham with 45 points, also a playoff career-high — and missed 7 of 12 free throws.
The Pistons are hoping to bounce back from the brink of elimination as they did against the Magic two-plus decades ago.
Detroit’s comeback in 2003 as a No. 1 seed against eighth-seeded Orlando was the first of seven times NBA teams have come back from a 3-1 deficit this century.
The Denver Nuggets were the last team to pull off the feat in 2020, when they became the first franchise in the league to do it twice in one postseason.
