Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Pacers succumb to Heat in final minutes


The Pacers lost to the visiting Miami Heat 87-83 Tuesday night in Game 2 of their Eastern Conference final series. The series is tied at 1-1 with Game 3 scheduled for 8:30 p.m. Saturday night in Miami.
Forethoughts
This is why Miami is a championship team. No matter how frustrating it was to watch, this one couldn't be blamed on Joey Crawford or any of the other referees. The bottom line is the Pacers offense in the final minutes was not efficient and what look like a possible victory for much of the night turned into a frustrating defeat. The passes were impatient and easy for the defense to read in those final minutes. If the Pacers passers, mainly Paul George a couple of times, had taken their time to read the defense, then they at least could have gotten some decent shots going down the stretch. It was no secret that the Heat were going to come out with more energy on defense and make some adjustments on defending the Pacers in the pick-and-roll. Now, it will be the Pacers turn to make the adjustment. They've got three days to figure out what to do. There are no real secrets between these teams when it comes to strengths and weaknesses of individuals players. Whatever the Pacers to do adjust, it will have be done as a team.
The Big Plays
Lance Stephenson's 25 points weren't enough to lift the Pacers Tuesday.
Well, maybe it wasn't so much one or two plays as much as what happened in the entire fourth quarter. The Heat's LeBron James and Dwyane Wade combined to score 25 points in the final quarter, including spurring a 10-0 run that gave them a seven-point lead with 2:20 to go.
The Ups
1) The biggest shame about this loss is that a great effort by Lance Stephenson did not lead to a win. Stephenson played with confidence and flare and put on the kind of performance a team needs in these type of games. He finished with 25 points on 10 of 17 shooting, with seven assists and six rebounds. He spurred a big third quarter for the Pacers by scoring 10 in the quarter and making the kind of plays that had the crowd completely into the game. Stephenson gave the Pacers more than what they needed to win this one.
2) Sure, many of us were down on Roy Hibbert in some of these Pacers playoff losses, but don't put this one on him. He had 13 rebounds to go with his 12 points on 5 of 9 shooting. And while he had just one blocked shot, it was apparent that when he was in the game, the Heat had trouble getting inside in their set offense.
The Downs
1) The Pacers need more from Paul George in these kind of games. No, he doesn't have to score 39 points, or anything like that, but he does need to know where to pass the ball when he gets double teamed. True, he shot poorly, hitting just 4 of 16 shots from the floor, but what the Pacers really can't live with from him late in games are key turnovers. And he was one of the turnover culprits the helped the Heat to that 10-0 run. The Heat are good enough defensively to make good players have bad shooting nights. But that's no excuse to make bad passes, too. George finished with three turnovers, which is not a lot, but the timing of them was the issue here.
2) This kind of goes hand in hand with the turnover issue as the Heat got some easy baskets off turnovers, but shot better than 50 percent from the field for the second straight game. And typically, if you allow a team to shoot 50 percent, you're not going to win. The Pacers have billed themselves as a defensive team all season. They better make some type of adjustment to get back to that. Also, they must do more to make Wade take more difficult shots if they want to win a game in Miami.
3) The worst thing of all is that now we've got to watch and listen to three-plus straight days of LeBronCenter.
Next Up
The Pacers will try to continue their five-game playoff road winning streak. While they played to get the home court advantage all season, their ability to win on the road is the reason they got this far. It seems they excel most when it's an "us against the world" type of situation. And they'll certainly be in that situation Saturday night with the Heat wanting to establish their home court advantage quickly. One piece of hope the Pacers have is that the Heat were fortunate to beat the Nets in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference semifinals in a 96-94 game, so that was not a fear-inspiring performance by the Heat at home either. But nonetheless, the home court is big in the NBA and if the Pacers want to continue that road winning streak, they'll have to have full intensity for the full 48 minutes . . . or more if needed.

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