SPC could've easily finished Gohan had Vegeta not stopped him

[DBZAOTA482]

You can clearly see Cell smiling while Gohan is struggling since he was only using <50%


Cell proceeds to mock Gohan like a madman as he slowly overpowers him, indicating he's still toying with him for a bit over finally going full throttle despite declaring he will end everything


Cell shouting "Goodbye!!!!" implies he's really to finish him off for good and the fact he even turned around to look at Vegeta shows he was never really threatened by Gohan in his current state


In the end, Gohan wiped out Cell completely but only was willing to do it after a distraction from Vegeta's end. The fact Gohan was completely gassed out after also shows he had to dig deep for that power to finally kill off Cell. He certainly would have the raw power to kill Cell so he's unquestionably stronger, but it was definitely with full-power and full-effort like Goku suggested instead of him using full-effort with <50% like some people believe, otherwise Cell bringing him to that state in the first place wouldn't make sense at all. He would have to be at least somewhat close to him in power to do that much damage with that much ease.

 

[Yoshi]

Vegeta attacking Cell wasn’t the only factor. Goku was telling Gohan to tap into more of his inner potential. This is one reason why this is an instance of a rage boost and Gohan’s transformation into SSJ2 actually wasn’t.

 

[ahill1]

Gohan was just not using 100% yet. I agree SPC is so what close to Gohan, but maybe Gohan would also unleash all of his power once Cell decided to increase the pushing force. I think it'd boil down to Gohan's slight advantage, which would overwhelm SPC, but after a struggling clash.

 

[GreatSaiyaman123]

Crazy that some people genuinely think <50% Gohan was as strong as Cell. In one of the pages you can see the beam is like a few meters away from Gohan.

I think Vegeta bought time/an opening for Gohan to fight back. If Gohan hadn't gone all out he'd have been wiped out in that instant. Not sure if Gohan could've killed Cell without Vegeta, Goku shouting "NOW" is more like "Seize the opportunity, it's now or never!" than "This is the moment we're waiting for".

 

[SSJ2]

The distraction made it possible for Gohan to overwhelm Cell easily once he accessed his full power. If it weren't for the distraction, it's debatable whether or not Gohan could have overwhelmed Cell like that. I definitely believe that Gohan was ahead of Cell, but it clearly wasn't by much.

 

[The_Authority]

Gohan was injured and also holding back because he didn't want to damage the Earth. That much is clear. Vegeta distracted Cell, which gave him enough of a weak point that he couldn't regain control after Gohan unleashed more power. That much is clear too.

What's not clear is how much power Gohan added into the Kamehame-Ha. Goku says that Gohan is worried about destroying Earth and to not worry about it because they can repair it with the Dragon Balls. But after Gohan unleashed more power, he didn't damage Earth and they don't use the Dragon Balls to repair it. So, did Gohan still have more in the reserve?