'It's not the recipe to win': How the Pacers won Game 1 of the NBA Finals anyway

Indianapolis Star

7 hours ago

OKLAHOMA CITY – Tyrese Haliburton didn't try to whitewash the bad out of the Indiana Pacers ' performance in the afterglow of another come-from-behind playoff win Thursday night.
Speaking after his last-second winner pushed the Pacers past Oklahoma City 111-110, Indiana's franchise-face point guard owned up to all that had gone wrong. Before adding a necessary caveat.
'This game, if you look at all the numbers, it's not the recipe to win,' Haliburton said. 'We can't turn the ball over that much. We have to do a better job of being in gaps, rebounding, all over the floor.
'But come May and June, it doesn't matter how you get them. Just get them.'
Haliburton was referencing 24 turnovers, 10 Oklahoma City offensive rebounds, stagnant, sideways offense and the undeniable truth that for at least three of Thursday's four quarters Indiana chased the Thunder unsuccessfully through a raucous Paycom Center.
Those numbers appeared to be adding up to what modern principles would label a losing performance. Too much wasted effort. Too many surrendered possessions. At sheer volume, Oklahoma City should've been out of sight before the Pacers' comeback even started to take shape, much less delivered a win.
Instead, Thursday's result offered a timely reminder that, for all the ways the sport has evolved in explaining success and failure, the simplest analysis can sometimes be the best: Hitting shots wins games, and no shot counts for more than a 3.
'Just let 'em go'
It has been Indiana's not-so-secret weapon throughout these playoffs.
The Pacers remain the only team in the postseason shooting better than 40% from behind the arc. Only twice in their 13 wins this postseason — the Game 5 clincher against Milwaukee and Game 2 in Cleveland — have they failed to hit more shots from distance than their opponent.
Against Oklahoma City on Thursday night, that gap was 18-11, and nine of the 10 Pacers who played made at least one 3. That's not an outlier: In these playoffs, an Indiana team that often goes 10 deep, has seven healthy contributors shooting at least 40% from behind the arc.
'We talk about letting it fly, shooting with confidence, trusting your process,' Pacers wing Aaron Nesmith said. 'Whenever we're down like that, and the game calls for it, you just let 'em go. We just have a lot of guys that are able to shoot the ball, shoot the ball with confidence and let it fly.'
This is not necessarily new. Indiana was a top-10 team shooting the 3 leaguewide during the regular season, with players like Nesmith, Andrew Nembhard, Pascal Siakam, Myles Turner and Ben Sheppard feeding off one another and the opportunities created by Haliburton, their emerging-star lead guard.
In the bigger picture, this team has been purpose-built to heat opponents up from distance. The Pacers were among the best-shooting teams in the playoffs last year as well, in their run to the Eastern Conference finals.
But this group has found its golden touch at the right time. After shooting 36.8% from behind the arc in the regular season (and just 36.6% across the last 15 games of that regular season), Indiana is weaponizing the 3-point line at a level no opponent has come close to touching thus far in the playoffs.
'Coach (Rick Carlisle) has been giving us confidence to let it fly,' Ben Sheppard said. 'When we get open shots, just go into it like we go into it in practice, and just be confident in our games and our shots.'
SUBHED
Having the weapon is wonderful in theory. Deploying it can be devastating in practice.
Oklahoma City learned that the hard way Thursday night. Despite those Pacers' turnovers, including 20 in the first half, and 38 points from league MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the Thunder and their league-best defense could not break Indiana's shooting rhythm when it mattered most.
Of the Pacers' 18 made 3s Thursday, 10 came in the second half, and six in a fourth quarter during which Oklahoma City hit none. After scoring just 45 points in the first half, Indiana poured in 66 in the second.
'You tip your hat to them. They made plays,' Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said postgame Thursday. 'This is part of their identity. They have a lot of belief. They never think they're out of it, so they play with great confidence even when their back's against the wall.'
This is the practical application of the 3-pointer, one that extends beyond just basic math.
Yes, the ability to crank up the volume from behind the arc can paper over all manner of sins. The Pacers deserved as much criticism for their turnovers Thursday as they did credit for limiting their damage to just 11 points scored directly from them.
But that's a measure of survival. Of simply not sinking. Of escaping a feral atmosphere and a ruthless Oklahoma City defense without coming apart at the seams.
The 3-pointer is — and for Indiana, on Thursday night, was — something different.
It stops runs, quiets crowds and turns games. For a team as confident as this one, makes become contagious, pumping confidence and swagger into a performance.
Difficult to quantify but easy to see, a run of made 3s flips a team from the back foot to the front, and so it was Thursday night for Indiana. As those shots started falling, Indiana shifted from survivor to aggressor, and never looked back.
'Especially in a game like that, where tensions are high, and stuff doesn't seem to be going our way, we see a bunch of different guys hitting 3s, it just gives everyone confidence and an energy boost we needed at that point in time,' Sheppard said. 'It's a huge shot, especially being down like we were that whole game. Seeing a 3 go in is a breath of fresh air for us.'
That fresh air turned into a tallgrass wind, sweeping the Pacers up and over their hosts. Oklahoma City should have been out of sight and was instead left reflecting on the missed opportunities of a Game 1 loss that, at very least, shifted the terms of a series the Thunder are now not such heavy favorites to win.
Given Indiana's across-the-board success shooting the ball in this postseason — and the great equalizer that 3-point line has become — another performance like Thursday night could reset those terms entirely.