Cavaliers vs. Pistons

Analysis

The pattern in this series is impossible to ignore: every game has gone to the home team. Detroit controlled Games 1 and 2 by double digits at Little Caesars Arena; Cleveland answered on their own floor. Now it's back in Detroit, and the Pistons have been a completely different animal on home court all year long. Cleveland's Game 4 win was special — but it needed Donovan Mitchell to produce a 39-point second half, one of the most electric individual performances of the postseason. Asking him to repeat that on short rest, in a hostile building, against a Pistons defence that gets noticeably nastier at home, is not a strategy. It's wishful thinking. Detroit's backcourt injuries are worth monitoring — Huerter and LeVert are questionable — and one model in this ensemble genuinely backed Cleveland based on cleaner availability numbers. That's the real risk, and it's not nothing. But the Pistons were a 60-win regular season team for a reason, and the crowd at Little Caesars Arena will be absolutely electric. Back the Pistons to take the series lead tonight — the home floor has decided every game in this series, and I'm not betting on Mitchell bailing Cleveland out twice in a row on the road.