Donovan Mitchell facing the Knicks with something to prove after playoff failures

CLEVELAND — The New Yorker has something to prove against the Knicks.

With Cleveland hosting a playoff game for the first time without LeBron James on its roster since (get this!) 1998, Donovan Mitchell is the focus of the playoff series and has plenty of motivators.

Beyond playing against his hometown squad — and beyond facing his mentor, Knicks associate head coach Johnnie Bryant — Mitchell has an opportunity to change the narrative of his playoff failures. It sets up perfectly against Jalen Brunson, the point guard who outplayed Mitchell in last year’s series between the Mavericks and Jazz.

Both players switched conferences in the summer — and were almost teammates in New York — but the defeat remains haunting to Mitchell.

He’s now just 2-4 in playoff series, while Brunson is coming off last year’s run to a place Mitchell has never seen: the conference finals.

Donovan Mitchell looks to erase his bitter playoff memories when he faces off against his hometown Knicks in first-round series. (Nick Cammett/AP)

“[I remember] how early I was at my house,” Mitchell, who is from Elmsford, N.Y., and played AAU ball in NYC, said of his first-round elimination to Brunson. “To be honest, watching those games, I’ll never forget just sitting there watching the rest of the first-round games and I’m just like, ‘Man, we’re done.’ I told these guys when we first started, you don’t want to be sitting in the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos or wherever you are going and thinking, ‘Man, I should have got this offensive rebound or I should have gotten that one stop.’

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“You don’t want to get up 3-1 and then lose. I’ve done that, too. All we needed was one game. Been up 2-0 and lost four straight. There’s different things I’ve experienced that are heartbreaking and obviously last year was definitely hard as well. Just coming in and understanding and playing with a sense of desperation.”

Mitchell’s rep as a defensive slouch intensified after the Jazz were carved up by Brunson, but he regrouped and exceeded expectations in Cleveland. The Daily News voted him fifth on the MVP ballot, which is an impressive regular-season barometer.

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But exorcizing demons means winning in the spring, not the winter.

“I’ve felt that way the whole year. That’s just been kind of my M.O. throughout my career — trying to prove my caliber of play,” Mitchell said. “I know who I am and these guys know who I am and what I’m capable of and I just go out there and be a leader. Not going to come in here and try and go and take over a game. Just play the game and do what I’ve been doing. Not make it too much of, ‘Oh, this is my thing.’ This is a team game and we’re not going to win if I just tried to shoot every single time. Got to do this as a group collectively. That’s what got us to this point. Just continue to do that.”

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Mitchell said he was so locked in that he’s avoiding Bryant, who is credited with developing the guard into a superstar while they were together in Utah.

“I haven’t talked to him in a while,” Mitchell said. “That’s family though. That’s like my brother. Love his kids. Love his family. Been with them 5,000 times. But right now, it’s time to go.”

It’s a long series — with friends on both sides and 11 days spanning the first five games — but a “no dinner with the opposition” policy is in effect.

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There’s a lot at stake.

“Don has a thing. He doesn’t get dinner with any opposing players who are in his city,” Knicks forward Josh Hart said. “So I’m going to do the same. I’m not going to have dinner with him.”