How the Pacers recaptured their identity to pull ahead in the Finals
Even though their remarkable Game 1 comeback win followed what's become a familiar playoff blueprint for them, the Indiana Pacers didn't really look like the Indiana Pacers in that contest against the Oklahoma City Thunder.
Their typically judicious offense turned the ball over an unthinkable 25 times. They couldn't get their deadly transition game in gear and were instead forced to grind out points in the halfcourt. Outside of a red-hot Obi Toppin, their deep and reliable bench got outplayed by OKC's. And until his stunning 18-foot game-winner, Tyrese Haliburton struggled to maneuver around or through the Thunder's menacing defense. There's a reason Haliburton said that the game, despite going Indiana's way, wasn't a recipe to win the series.
Game 2 brought more of the same. The Pacers were even more bogged down in the half court, their bench was outplayed even more thoroughly, and Haliburton's movement was even more constricted. The Thunder's comfortable win swung the feel and discourse surrounding the series back to the monumental uphill climb Indiana was facing.
Then Game 3 rolled around, and at last the Pacers played the distinct brand of basketball we'd come to recognize throughout the second half of this season and this entire playoff run. We saw their pace and flow, we saw them create space on offense and take it away on defense, and we saw their depth shine through. We also finally saw Haliburton in all his Haliburtonness, zipping hit-ahead passes to kickstart semi-transition plays, using screen rejects to breach the paint, and aggressively hunting his own shot against drop coverage. If there is indeed a recipe for Indiana to upset OKC and win the title, this game followed it almost to a T.
That doesn't mean replicating Game 3 is certain to produce similar results. The Thunder will be desperate in Game 4 and beyond; they're going to punch back. The Pacers still have a lot they need to improve upon - like pick-and-roll defense, for example - if they're to win two more games and hoist the Larry O'Brien Trophy. But it's a very encouraging sign that they pulled out a 116-107 victory despite hitting just nine 3-pointers, shooting eight fewer free throws and grabbing two fewer offensive rebounds than OKC did, and getting three catastrophic quarters from an ailing Myles Turner.
They won by protecting the basketball and winning the turnover battle for the first time in the series. They did it by outscoring the Thunder in the paint after being outscored on the interior by 20 points across the first two games. They did it by holding Shai Gilgeous-Alexander in check with relentless full-court pressure. More than anything, they did it by turning defense into offense. That's a cornerstone of Indiana's identity that was glaringly absent from Games 1 and 2.
After getting out in transition on just 10.9% of their possessions in those first two games, the Pacers did so 17.2% of the time in Game 3, per Cleaning the Glass. Most notably, they scored 1.63 points per possession when running off live defensive rebounds (which they did 28% of the time) after previously averaging 0.81 points on those possessions.
Whether it was Pascal Siakam leaking out, Toppin zooming behind the entire Thunder defense with pure hustle, or Haliburton pushing the tempo himself off his team-high eight defensive rebounds, the Pacers consistently sowed the kind of chaos and confusion in which they thrive.
But while they spent much more of Game 3 playing in the open floor, their offense was actually more deliberate in the halfcourt than earlier in the series, per Inpredictable. After routinely hoisting on their first half-decent look in Game 2 as a means of avoiding the turnovers that plagued them in Game 1, the Pacers were a bit more patient in Game 3 - a bit more willing to let actions progress and let good looks snowball into better ones. That patience, coupled with their early-offense opportunism, was a big part of the reason the Pacers were able to nearly double their rim frequency, from 16% in Game 2 to 31% in Game 3.
Another big reason: T.J. McConnell, who completely changed the tenor of the game when he checked in late in the first quarter. He provided that sorely needed dose of rim pressure with his shot-from-a-cannon drives, which he finished either with layups, kickouts, or passes to cutters. He applied his trademark defensive pressure, coming up with five steals in 15 minutes, including three off inbounds passes in the backcourt. His first shift quickly turned an eight-point deficit into a Pacers lead, and they never trailed by more than two possessions the rest of the way.
He was joined on Indiana's bench brigade by a scalding-hot Bennedict Mathurin, who managed to harness his frenetic energy and channel it into a flurry of smooth mid-range pull-ups and power drives that even the ultra-physical Thunder couldn't contain. He finished with 27 points on 9-for-12 shooting, tying Manu Ginobili and Jason Terry for the third-highest bench scoring total in Finals history. His self-creation and shot-making helped buy Haliburton five minutes of rest to start the fourth quarter, during which the Pacers erased a five-point deficit. He was so unstoppable that OKC eventually had to put Alex Caruso on him - the ultimate sign of respect.
The Pacers also got huge bench contributions from Toppin and Ben Sheppard. On top of gashing the Thunder in transition, Toppin rotated well on defense, came through with two massive plays in crunch time (a putback dunk and a block on a Jalen Williams drive), and finished as a game-high plus-18. Sheppard's sticky point-of-attack defense on Gilgeous-Alexander was critical, especially with Andrew Nembhard and Aaron Nesmith battling foul trouble.
The Pacers' defense as a whole was outstanding after the first quarter, especially in holding the Thunder to just 18 points in the fourth. It started with Nembhard, who had one of the most impactful defensive performances anyone's had against Gilgeous-Alexander this season. He face-guarded the MVP for 94 feet, dodged screens to stay attached to his hip, and refused to bite on any of his fakes. He was so effective at denying Gilgeous-Alexander the ball that the Thunder had to reroute a big chunk of their offense to Williams, whose time of possession jumped from an average of 3.9 minutes across the first two games of the series to 5.5 in Game 3, while Gilgeous-Alexander's dropped from 8.6 minutes to 6.5.
Williams largely rose to that challenge, but he was occasionally loose with the ball and demonstrated some questionable judgment. He and Gilgeous-Alexander combined for 10 turnovers and just seven assists. The Thunder as a team coughed it up 19 times, their most in any game this postseason and their second-highest total of the whole campaign. That's a credit to a defense that's steadily improved from leaky to solid to borderline elite over the season.
Haliburton's improvement on that end has been a central component, and that was on display again in this game as he jumped passing lanes, got his hands in driving gaps, and prevented Gilgeous-Alexander from turning the corner or splitting hedges when defending pick-and-rolls. Siakam was also everywhere on the back line when he wasn't gamely hanging with OKC's guards on switches. And after being possibly the worst player on the floor for either team up to that point, Turner was an essential ingredient in that decisive fourth quarter, stepping up his ball-screen coverage, locking down the paint, and physically overwhelming Chet Holmgren.
Again, there's still a long way to go, and the Thunder will have a whole lot to say about where this series goes from here. But the Pacers have already answered every question about whether they belong on this stage and whether they can hang with the 68-win juggernaut from the West. They may not look quite like the champions we're accustomed to, but this is indisputably a championship-caliber team playing championship-level basketball.
Joe Wolfond writes about the NBA for theScore.