NBA Game 7 winners and losers: Will Pistons or Magic make second round?

Lorenzo Reyes, USA TODAYSun, May 3, 2026 at 9:03 PM UTC

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NBA Game 7 winners and losers: Will Pistons or Magic make second round?

In the NBA, there’s nothing better than a Game 7.

Fortunately for fans tuning in Sunday, May 3, there are two of them, between the No. 1 Detroit Pistons and No. 8 Orlando Magic and between the No. 4 Cleveland Cavaliers and No. 5 Toronto Raptors.

In win-or-go-home scenarios, teams tend to elevate their play and compete with desperation. Perhaps no team is feeling that more than Orlando, which had a 3-1 series lead before it allowed the Pistons to win two in a row, the most recent after an epic choke job in Game 6 in which the Magic shot only 4-of-37 from the floor in the second half.

Here are the winners and losers from Sunday’s NBA Playoffs Game 7s:

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WINNERSPaolo Banchero

He scored the Magic’s first 11 points and set the tone for Orlando, including draining the first three 3-pointers he attempted. Banchero aggressively sought his shot, and, when Detroit diverted more defensive attention toward Banchero, he tried to find his teammates.

He finished the half with 23 points on 9-of-14 shooting. His biggest issue was that his teammates simply didn’t knock down their shots.

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Tobias Harris

He erupted for 17 points in the second quarter and scored 19 overall in the first half, and Harris was the player who helped spark a 20-6 run to end the first half.

Mortiz Wagner delivers solid minutes off the bench

His stats weren’t noteworthy, but Wagner provided a spark off the bench with 6:15 high-energy minutes. His brother, Franz Wagner, is out with a right calf strain, but Mortiz Wagner posted the highest plus-minus (+7) of any Magic player in the first half.

LOSERSThe rest of the Magic

Orlando’s other starters combined to miss their first six shots of Game 7, and the Magic players not named Banchero shot just 8-of-27 (29.6%) in the first half.

While Banchero had 9 field goals in the first half, no other Orlando player had more than 2.

Duncan Robinson

One of the big weaknesses this Pistons team has is perimeter shooting. Duncan Robinson was acquired in a July 2025 sign-and-trade to address the issue. In the first half Sunday, Robinson struggled from the floor, even though many of his looks were open ones. Robinson started the game 1-for-7 and finished the half 2-of-9 for 5 points.

Magic turnovers

Orlando can’t afford to have careless possessions, and a 9-3 deficit in the turnover battle was the key reason why Detroit went on that big run to close the half; the Pistons, not surprisingly, lead the battle in points off turnovers 12-3.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Pistons vs Magic first of 2 Game 7s in NBA playoffs: Winners, losers

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Source: “AOL Sports”