Inside Donovan Mitchell’s historic 71-point night: ‘Best performance I’ve ever seen’
Donovan Mitchell #DonovanMitchell
CLEVELAND, Ohio — The final box scores were printed out and stacked at the entrance to the Cleveland Cavaliers’ locker room for Donovan Mitchell to sign.
Everyone wanted a piece of history.
Mitchell’s keepsake had 71 inked in large numerals with a black permanent marker — a number representing his franchise-record point total. His name is now forever etched in the history books, with one of those autographed box scores headed to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass.
“In my 15 years, that’s the best performance I’ve ever seen,” Kevin Love said following the Cavaliers’ extraordinary 145-134 come-from-behind overtime win against the Bulls.
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Love has had a front-row seat to greatness since joining the Cavs in 2014. To him, only a few performances are worthy of being uttered in the same breath as what he witnessed Monday night.
Kyrie Irving going for 55 against Portland on Jan. 29, 2015. Irving’s 57-point masterpiece in San Antonio on March 13, 2015. LeBron James in Game 1 of the 2018 NBA Finals — a night in which he would have lifted the overmatched Cavaliers to a victory over the stacked Golden State Warriors, if not for George Hill’s missed free throw and JR Smith’s late-game clock-related blunder. Game 5 of the 2016 Finals in which Irving and James were both unstoppable — the start of Cleveland’s storybook championship rally.
But not even James and Irving accomplished Mitchell’s feat Monday night, as the organization’s new star poured in 71 points on 22 of 34 from the field, 7 of 15 from 3-point range and 20 of 25 from the free-throw line in 50 magnificent minutes.
The best from James and Irving was 57 — those two Cavaliers icons side-by-side in the record books, sharing the franchise’s single-game scoring mark.
Until Monday.
“This one takes the cake,” Love said. “That was something special tonight.
Special isn’t a strong enough word. Legendary is more poignant. Mitchell, 26, became just the seventh player in NBA history to score more than 70 points in a game — and first since Phoenix shooting guard Devin Booker on March 24, 2017.
Wilt Chamberlain. Kobe Bryant. David Thompson. David Robinson. Elgin Baylor. Booker. Mitchell.
Welcome to the 70-point club.
“It’s humbling. I’m speechless to be honest with you,” Mitchell said. “Not only did I do that but I did it in an effort where we came back and won and it’s how we won. This is nuts. I’m extremely blessed and humbled that I’m in that company, in that group.
“I’ve always believed I can be one of the best players in this league, but I have to keep working. This is a big milestone but at the end of the day, we have to continue. Those other guys (in the 70-point club) have all won at the highest level and that’s my ultimate goal. But to be there in the record books with them is truly incredible.”
Not even Michael Jordan — one of Mitchell’s idols and the inspiration behind him wearing No. 45, an homage to Jordan’s minor league baseball number with the Birmingham Barons — reached that rarified air. Jordan’s career-high was 69.
How appropriate that Mitchell’s magnum opus was written against MJ’s old team.
“I’ve never been witness to a performance like that live,” Cavs coach J.B. Bickerstaff said. “I think we’ve seen some on TV before, but we were treated tonight to one of the greatest performances in the history of the NBA.”
It didn’t look like it early.
Mitchell told cleveland.com he altered his gameday routine slightly on Monday. It wasn’t something superstitious, trying to reverse a nasty trend that started with a 12-point clunker against the Toronto Raptors on Dec. 23 and continued in Chicago on Saturday — a night he used colorful language (s—–) to describe his recent play.
A video game nut who plays Call of Duty or MLB the Show following every shootaround, Mitchell got stuck playing Xbox with Brooklyn Nets swingman Royce O’Neale and Kyrie Irving for longer than desired. That heated battle kept Mitchell from his usual pregame nap — even though Irving encouraged Mitchell to stop playing and get some shut-eye.
“I didn’t sleep. I didn’t get no rest,” Mitchell told cleveland.com outside the locker room. “I was pissed. But after the way I had been playing, I just came to the arena telling myself to play loose. There were a few times before the game I had to remind myself to just breathe, be myself and got get it.”
Mitchell also received spirited pep talks from vice president of communications B.J. Evans and Cavaliers luminary Brad Daugherty. No one was willing to reveal the actual words, but Mitchell termed it helpful encouragement to bust him out of an uncharacteristic four-game funk. That’s the PG-rated version anyway.
“It caught me by surprise. Just said to keep pushing. It was like, ‘You a bad dude. Keep plugging away,’” Mitchell responded when asked what led to the turnaround. “When you go into these streaks when you’re not really shooting the ball well, not playing well as a whole, you just keep pushing. Be overly — maybe not overly aggressive — but just force yourself into the game by any means necessary. And that’s what I ended up doing.”
Mitchell started slow. He missed five of his first seven shots — a carryover from the inefficient performance in Chicago, where the Bulls attacked him with extra defenders and made it uncomfortable throughout.
At the end of the first quarter, Mitchell had just five points. Not good enough on a night the Cavs were once again without All-Star backcourt mate Darius Garland because of a sprained right thumb and last year’s Rookie of the Year runner-up Evan Mobley, who is dealing with right ankle soreness.
“I’ve played with a lot of really, really good players and they rarely have two bad games in a row,” Caris LeVert told cleveland.com. “I know he felt like he played bad last game. But I knew he was going to have a big game. Now 70? I didn’t know that was in the cards. But I knew he was going to have a big game. Even when he started slow, I knew he was going to figure it out. Missed shots don’t affect him.”
Nonetheless, Mitchell’s frustration was obvious. The typically-respectful and mild-mannered shooting guard picked up his first technical foul of the season, arguing with the officiating crew over a non-call late in the second quarter.
That seemed to flip a switch. Mitchell scored Cleveland’s final eight points of the first half, going into the locker room with a swagger in his gait.
In the third quarter, he went nuclear.
Learning from Saturday’s meeting with Chicago, Mitchell repeatedly put his head down and attacked the retreating Bulls. He split double-teams. He beat hedges. He darted around defenders. He finished through contact. He rained in jumpers, posing and gesticulating after. He shot early in the clock, ignoring the decree to play at a slow pace.
It was an ethereal awakening. Weeks in the making.
“That was like some video-game stuff,” LeVert told cleveland.com. “Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever done that in a video game before. That was incredible. If he doesn’t do that, we don’t win. He was unguardable the whole game. They were fouling him all night. He wasn’t foul-baiting. They just couldn’t guard him, so they had to foul him. They couldn’t do anything with him at all.”
By the end of those 12 third-quarter minutes, Mitchell had erupted for 24 points on 6 of 9 shooting and 12 of 12 from the foul line. He tallied 24 of the team’s 44 points, yanking them out of a 21-point hole and cutting the Chicago advantage to just five heading into the fourth.
During the between-quarter stoppage, Mitchell and Bickerstaff had a brief chat. The two have built a foundation of trust since Mitchell’s arrival from Utah in the September blockbuster trade that has launched Cleveland back into contention. Even though Mitchell usually sits early in the fourth before returning after a couple-minute breather, Monday was an exception.
“Just don’t take me out,” Mitchell said when asked about his message to Bickerstaff. “I said, ‘Look, I’m good. I will find my ways.’ When you ask to stay in the game and coach allows you, you have to be able to go out there and do your job. Otherwise, I ask to do it again and it’s not going to happen. If I ask to do it, I have to be ready for it.”
He was. And Bickerstaff felt Mitchell earned the right to finish what he started.
“I don’t know how many guys are capable of doing what he did tonight,” Bickerstaff said. “We tried to use our timeouts as wisely as we could to get him as many blows as we could. What he was able to do just speaks volumes to who he is. It wasn’t one of those games where we were in control, or it was back and forth, or it was a blowout in our favor. Every single play he made was necessary.”
The Cavs never led in regulation. They trailed for 47 minutes. There was one lead change and three ties, with the most important tie coming with 4.1 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter.
After Bulls reserve guard Coby White canned a pair of clutch free throws to put Chicago ahead by three, the Cavs inbounded the ball to Mitchell who started to dribble up the court. Not wanting him to get a shot at a game-tying triple, the Bulls fouled Mitchell immediately.
The early-season MVP candidate, who heard those bellows from the sellout crowd for much of the second half, calmly buried the first free throw.
Then both teams made substitutions. Burly backup center Robin Lopez checked in to give Cleveland an extra rebounder, as Mitchell was sure to intentionally brick the next freebie. Chicago countered with Patrick Williams and Andre Drummond.
The Cavs down by two. Just 4.7 seconds left. Mitchell going through his usual routine. He opened his eyes, sighted the rim, bent his knees and hoisted a high-arching rainbow that bounced off the rim and started to drop towards the floor.
Amongst a sea of bodies, Mitchell ran off the stripe (perhaps a beat early), worked his way around Williams, soared for the loose ball, grabbed it in midair and spun in the layup — an unfathomable play that the Cavs have practiced just once all season. A jaw-dropping putback for his record-setting 58th point.
“The basketball gods love these moments,” Bickerstaff said. “When you do the things that you’re supposed to do, they show you favor, and I think tonight was an example of that.”
Despite the Cavs only going through that end-of-game situation once — earlier this season in the opener against Toronto — Mitchell has previous experience with it from Utah. It’s why he called for Bickerstaff to sub in Lopez. Originally, Love was going to set up around the key opposite Jarrett Allen. But Lopez and Love switched spots, with Lopez underneath and Love starting outside the 3-point arc. The idea was for Love to crash or be available for a tap-out.
It was similar to Mitchell’s Utah days. One of the things he used to go over with ex-coach Quin Snyder was intentionally missing a free throw. It was a monthly Jazz practice staple, as Snyder wanted to have a specific set in that critical situation. Each time, the session started with two bigs in rebounding positions — Derrick Favors and Rudy Gobert or Hassan Whiteside and Gobert. But the alignment was only part of the equation. The shooter also needed to determine how they wanted to miss.
Each player has their own way. Mitchell prefers to put loft on the ball.
“It’s just so unpredictable,” he said. “It can hit and go right. It can hit and go left. At least, when they loft it, like for me, I put it up there and it hits the rim and goes up, so now I can put myself in the play. Then just go jump and try and make a play. Tap it out. Grab it. In this case make the layup.”
Mitchell said that’s the first time he’s purposely missed a free throw, collected his own rebound and scored all in the same sequence — even though he’s been in situations where the ball was batted out for a missed game-winner.
“Luka (Doncic) had two of them,” Mitchell said. “I watched the first and I was like, ‘That would be cool if I could go ahead and get one.’ Once I made the first free throw, that’s when I was like, ‘OK, God’s got something for me here.’ That can go a few ways. It happened to go my way and I made the layup. Once I made that, I sat in the huddle and J.B. and I started laughing and I was like, ‘Might as well win the game at this point.’”
Fittingly, it was Mitchell who finally gave Cleveland its first lead of the night in OT — a cold-blooded step-back triple. Ahead by three after that dagger, the Cavs never looked back, outscoring the Bulls 15-4 in OT. Mitchell made all four of his shot attempts in the extra session and registered 13 of the team’s 15.
In all, Mitchell scored 55 after halftime.
“I wish I saw it on ESPN against another team,” said Bulls guard Zach LaVine, who finished with 26 in a losing effort. “I just wish we played better defensively, gave him better looks, something. Too late to say that now.”
To punctuate his epic night, Mitchell added 11 assists and eight rebounds, nearly recording his first career triple-double. He accounted for 99 of the team’s 145 points. He is the first player ever to score at least 70 points and dish out 10 or more assists in the same game.
“He has that ‘it’ factor to him,” Love said of Mitchell. “He just raised all of our level of play, put us on his back. He means everything to this team.”
Mitchell has been playing basketball a long time. On the playground. Grade school. High School. AAU. College. NBA.
Only once has he ever had a 70-point outburst. That came while playing NBA 2k on his gaming system.
“When I first got into the league, I played as the Jazz and I was just shooting it every time,” Mitchell said while laughing. “I don’t think I did it this efficiently in 2k. The closest I think I’ve got was the Bubble, but that was in a loss. This one feels a lot better.”
Mitchell’s 71 points are tied with Baylor and Robinson for the eighth-highest total in a single game in NBA history. It’s the most points scored in the NBA this season. Mitchell’s previous regular-season best was 46, hitting that number three times with the Jazz. He tallied 57 in the Bubble.
After the game, a drenched Mitchell strutted around the locker room and made a playful quip about having an off day tomorrow. Mitchell — and the Cavs — deserve it. Probably need it.
Around that same time, his teammates’ phones were blowing up with reactions to the instant classic. Love, still part of a group text with the 2016 Cavaliers title team, sent out a message harkening back to the trajectory-altering offseason trade that made Monday night possible.
What was Donovan’s asking price?
Collin Sexton, Lauri Markkanen, Ochai Agbaji, three first-round picks and a pair of pick swaps. It seemed like a hefty price at the time. But given how he’s played this season, it now feels like a heist.
The Cavs would do it all over again. They have 71 reasons why.
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