Daniss Jenkins goes from being an undrafted free agent on a 2-way contract to key player for Pistons

DETROIT (AP) - Daniss Jenkins was overlooked and underappreciated for much of his career.

Not anymore.

Jenkins has played himself into a key role with the top-seeded Detroit Pistons, earning 29 minutes of playing time in their Game 1 win over the fourth-seeded Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference semifinals.

He had 12 points and three assists, bringing the ball up the court at times to give Cade Cunningham a break. He also had playoff career highs with seven rebounds and four steals.

In the last 3:23, he scored six points, grabbed three rebounds and had a steal to help Detroit pull away.

"This team didn't win 60 games just because of (Cunningham)," Cavs coach Kenny Atkinson said. "They have really good players surrounding him and a really good bench."

Jenkins has become Detroit's top guard off the bench, playing 29 minutes in each of the last two games.

That's pretty impressive for a second-year pro who was on a two-way contract just a few months ago. An undrafted free agent after playing for four schools, including a junior college, he spent most of his rookie season in the G League.

"My whole journey, it hasn't been pretty, but it's about fighting through adversity," Jenkins said. "So, I just try to go out and let that show when I play."

He's been doing that for months for the Pistons.

The 6-foot-4, 190-pound Jenkins didn't play in half of the first 10 games this season, then made the most of his opportunities when he got a shot to play in November.

He scored a then-career-high 24 points in a win over Washington and averaged 19-plus points over the next four games - all victories.

In February, he played in a 42nd game, which turned his two-way deal into an $8 million, two-year contract.

When Cunningham was out of the lineup in March with a collapsed lung, Jenkins scored a career-high 30 points in a win over the Los Angeles Lakers. That was part of his 10-game streak of scoring in double digits.

Jenkins finished the regular season averaging 9.3 points and 3.9 assists, solid numbers for a player getting 20 minutes per game off the bench.

"He's been building for it all year," Detroit guard Duncan Robinson said. "His journey is unique, and it takes somebody with a special will and character to have that story.

"He has unshakeable confidence for someone who's been overlooked his whole career, and he just wears it as a chip."

Like the team, Jenkins got off to a slow start in the first round against the Orlando Magic before rallying.

He missed 11 of 14 shots over the first two games and didn't score more than seven points in a game until he had 16 points and five assists in Game 7.

"It was just a matter of him growing into playoff basketball," coach J.B. Bickerstaff said Wednesday. "If you go back to that series, he got better every single game and it carried over (in Game 1)."

Jenkins, who is from Dallas, started his college career at Pacific and then spent one season at a junior college in Texas. He transferred to Iona and spent his fifth year at St. John's, leading the Red Storm in scoring.

He signed a two-way deal in Detroit shortly after every team passed on him in the 2024 NBA draft. He played in seven games for the Pistons last year, scoring a total of seven points, and averaged 18.5 points and 6.4 assists for the Motor City Cruise.

Jenkins has come a long way, but doesn't spend too much time looking back.

"I try to reflect a little bit, but I don't try to get too much out of the moment because we're still in it," he said. "We're still trying to win it, and we're not nowhere where we want to be.

"It's s definitely rewarding and I try to soak it all up while I'm going through it, but yet still stay in the moment and stay hungry."