Detroit Pistons guard Cade Cunningham received a dose of positive news from the league on Thursday
During the course of the 2025-26 regular season, Detroit Pistons point guard Cade Cunningham separated himself into an elite category of top-flight NBA stars as he propelled his team to the top spot in the Eastern Conference early on.
Averaging 26 points and 10 assists by the mid-year break, Cunningham was selected as a starter for the All-Star Game, and the fifth-year guard began to receive recognition for his two-way game as a key piece of Detroit’s top five defense. But during the final month of the season, Cunningham suffered a collapsed lung while diving for a loose ball in the first quarter against the Washington Wizards, and the All-Star starter was forced to leave the game as a result of his fluke injury.
Cunningham sat out for over two weeks while the Pistons fought to maintain their position atop the East, but Detroit was able to ease the Oklahoma State product back into the lineup a few games before the regular season concluded. But even with his brief reintroduction into the lineup, Cunningham fell two games short of the NBA’s 65-game requirement, which meant that the Pistons’ floor general would be ineligible for the league’s All-NBA team or any awards for that matter.
But after a strict review of the process and the reasoning behind Cunningham’s multi-week injury absence, the NBA ruled in favor of both Cunningham and Doncic's Extraordinary Circumstances challenge, who missed multiple games due to the birth of his daughter in Slovenia, would be eligible to receive awards relating to the 2025-26 season.
"The NBA and NBPA agreed that, taking into account the totality of the circumstances for Cunningham and Doncic, each player qualified for awards under the extraordinary circumstances provisions in the CBA."
According to the NBPA’s release, Minnesota Timberwolves guard Anthony Edwards also issued a challenge so that he could potentially retain eligibility for awards and/or the All-NBA team, but the league ultimately ruled that his challenge was unsuccessful.
By many projections, both Cunningham and Doncic are likely to land on the All-NBA first team after putting up MVP-caliber numbers all season long. Cunningham helped Detroit find its rhythm with an early-season 13-game winning streak, one that tied a franchise record, and he pushed the Pistons to the one seed from wire-to-wire. Doncic, on the other hand, registered over 30 points per game for the Lakers and drove LA to the four seed in a highly competitive Western Conference, so both players have compelling arguments as to why they could be in line to receive such honors.
While Cunningham is often highlighted for his playmaking ability and on-court vision, the Pistons guard was the only player in the NBA to record 3+ blocks and 3+ steals in four games this season, which shows how Cade fits right in with the defensive-minded Detroit squad.
Before Cunningham and Doncic were ruled eligible, Pistons center Jalen Duren was projected to slot in at the tail-end of the All-NBA third team, but now that there are two more players who will likely receive recognition ahead of JD, the big man's award future looks coincidentally more murky than it did 24 hours ago.
For Cunningham, Detroit’s engine is more focused with the task at hand. The Pistons are set to open the playoffs on Sunday, April 19 at 6:30 pm, but the squad still does not know who they will face in the opening round.
Last night, the Philadelphia 76ers took down the Orlando Magic in the play-in round, which funneled the losers of that battle into a matchup with the Charlotte Hornets on Friday. The winner of that game will face the Pistons two days later in Detroit, so the top seed in the East is tabbed to square off against either the Magic or the Hornets.
During the regular season, the Pistons accrued a clean three-game sweep over the Hornets, which included one fiery mid-season affair back in February, but Detroit had a bit more difficulty with a 2-2 record against the Magic.
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