Cade Cunningham had never scored 50 points in an NBA game. By the time the Detroit Pistons finally escaped Washington on Thursday night, he had 52 — and a stat line the league had not seen in nearly half a century. Cunningham scored a career-high 52 points with 11 assists and zero turnovers as Detroit outlasted the Washington Wizards 144-140 in double overtime at Capital One Arena, a game the Wizards twice dragged back from the dead with last-second shots.
The Pistons needed every one of those points. Trae Young's 3-pointer at the buzzer forced the first overtime, and rookie AJ Dybantsa's midrange jumper with less than a second left sent the teams to a second one. Washington even scored the first seven points of the first overtime to lead 128-121 — and then Cunningham took the game over for good.
The finish
Cunningham opened the second overtime with a 3-pointer, and when Anthony Davis fouled out to hand Detroit the upper hand, the Pistons' star scored from the baseline to make it 142-138 with 25.3 seconds left. Washington never got closer, and the Wizards' losing streak stretched to six games.
Thirty of Cunningham's 52 points came in the fourth quarter and the two overtimes, including 18 in the fourth quarter alone — the burst that sent the game to overtime in the first place. He finished 16 of 25 from the field, 3 of 5 from three-point range and 17 of 18 from the free-throw line in 48 minutes of a 58-minute game.
What makes the line so unusual is that it asks one player to do three hard things at once, for almost an entire game. Scoring 50 points takes volume and efficiency. Handing out 11 assists takes playmaking under pressure. Doing both without a single turnover across 48 minutes — while handling the ball on nearly every important possession, in a game that went to two overtimes — takes a level of care that usually costs a player points or assists. Cunningham gave up neither, and he gave the ball away not once.
A first since 1977-78
The number that will follow Cunningham's name is the one with the zero in it. According to OptaSTATS, he became the first NBA player to record at least 50 points and 10 assists without a turnover since the league began tracking turnovers in the 1977-78 season. No player in the turnover era had ever put together a 50-10-0 game before him.
The qualifier matters, and it makes the feat harder, not easier. The NBA did not record turnovers as an official statistic before 1977-78, so the mark covers the entire modern era of the league — every superstar season of the last 48 years, and nobody had done it. Cunningham's previous career high was 46 points, set just over a year ago — also against Washington.
Thompson's first triple-double
Cunningham did not do it alone. Ausar Thompson had 17 points, 11 rebounds and 11 assists for his first career triple-double, and Daniss Jenkins scored 21 points for the Pistons before fouling out. It was Detroit's second win over Washington in four games — the Pistons also overcame Davis' 44 points to beat the Wizards on Monday — and their second straight win overall.
Washington's night of almosts
The cruel part for the Wizards is how close they came, twice, and how much went right for them anyway. Young finished with 37 points and 14 assists — two more assists than Washington's whole team managed in a loss at Indiana the previous night — and made all 17 of his free throws, though he shot just 8 of 23 from the field.
Davis had 30 points and 15 rebounds, and Alex Sarr scored 30 points on 12-of-14 shooting, going a perfect 10 of 10 from the field in regulation. Together with Young, they gave the franchise its first trio of 30-point scorers since Mike Davis, Earl Monroe and Gus Johnson did it for the Baltimore Bullets on November 18, 1969. Kyshawn George fouled out after scoring 14 points for Washington.
What comes next
The Pistons head to Miami on Saturday night, and the Wizards host Houston on Sunday. For Detroit, the win is a second straight and another sign that its 24-year-old franchise guard — the No. 1 pick in the 2021 draft — is turning into the kind of player who can bend a game to his will for 48 minutes without giving the ball away once. For Washington, it is a sixth straight loss, and a reminder that even a historic night from three of its own players can end in a loss when the other team's star is having a night nobody has ever had.
The free-throw line told the same story. Cunningham made 17 of his 18 attempts, and Young made all 17 of his, in a game where the final margin was four points and the last minute was decided possession by possession. In the end, the difference was not the shooting or the free throws — both teams had those. It was that Detroit's star never handed Washington a single extra possession, and Washington's last-second heroics, twice, still were not enough.
Photo: Cade Cunningham in a Detroit Pistons uniform during the 2022 NBA All-Star weekend. (Erik Drost / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0)
