How pace is working in Pacers’ favor against Cavs
By CHRIS GOFF
All in all, it was a good trip to Cleveland for the Pacers.
They got out of “Believeland” with a split, and even in losing Game 2 on Wednesday night put enough of a scare into the fourth-seeded Cavaliers to have Indiana feeling good about these next two, both in Indianapolis, starting tonight with Game 3.
LeBron James landed a personal 13-0 haymaker to start Wednesday’s game en route to the Cavs’ 100-97 win at Quicken Loans Arena that evened this best-of-seven first-round series at a game apiece.
While James played like the best player in the world (which he still is at age 33), we wonder whether too many people are making this series too much about Cleveland and not enough about Indiana.
Through two games, No. 5 seed Indiana is playing like the better team.
Counter-intuitively, Wednesday showed that even more than Game 1, as the Pacers fought and clawed their way back from an early 18-point deficit and had a chance to tie the game in the final minute.
Plus, as unstoppable as James was with 46 points, 12 rebounds and five assists, he received virtually no support. Kevin Love and Kyle Korver played decently, and J.R. Smith defended with vigor, but that was it.
Jordan Clarkson, an effective offensive weapon in each of his four NBA seasons, and who torched the Pacers for 33 points, seven assists and seven boards in a January game at the Staples Center, is 3-of-10 with just eight points for the series.
James and Love can only do so much. On Wednesday, they scored 61 points, only to have the Cavs’ other eight rotation players combine for 39.
And, of course, there are Cleveland’s turnovers – 17 in Game 1 and 15 in Game 2.
Keep in mind the Pacers are playing with house money. They’re crashing a party they weren’t supposed to be invited to for another year or two and suddenly have a chance to make some real noise.
So why should the manner in which this first-round affair is unfolding be viewed through gold-tinted glasses?
Because pace – no pun intended – has been a major issue. The Pacers have completely controlled the tempo and made this the foremost slow-it-down, grind-it-out series of this year’s playoffs.
Indiana played the league’s seventh-slowest pace in the regular season. Cleveland, while not quite among the NBA’s most frenetic clubs, still ranked 12th in pace factor at 100.1.
Of course, postseason games do tend to be played at a slower pace, anyway, but the pace factor for this series, 93.7, is far slower than the norm.
And believe it or not, the Pacers are basically getting to have their cake and eat it, too, since Indiana has still managed to score 33 fast-break points.
Indiana is giving the heavily favored Cavs fits. Only a few people picked the Pacers to make it even a six-game series. Now a handful even dare to say Indy is the favorite.
“I think they feel like that,” Pacer star Victor Oladipo said, “and we feel like that.”
