Why the Pacers

In the past few days I have read many posts and I have watched and listened to many analyses regarding the Eastern Conference Finals (ECF) and it seems like nobody is actually believing that this Pacers team – the no.1 seed in the East – has any chance of advancing to the NBA Finals. I can understand this, up to a point, because of their inconsistency in the first two rounds of the play-offs against much weaker teams. However, I consider this treatment of the best team of the Eastern Conference, based on their regular season record, to be at least unfair. So, I intend in the following few paragraphs to provide five reasons why I see the Pacers advancing to the NBA Finals instead of the defenders of the title Heat.

Bad Matchups

I understand that when you are the number 1 seed everybody is expecting from you to at least win comfortably in the first round and to show some signs of the dominance you exhibited throughout the regular season. The Pacers instead showed a team that had no rhythm and was unable to dominate and play its game against an Atlanta Hawks team that finished the season with a negative record (38-44). Almost the same type of inconsistency, with some signs of improvement, characterized their second round games against a very good Wizards team. However, if we take a closer look at these two matchups we will see that they were bad matchups for the Pacers.

Jeff Teague’s speed and quickness was a major factor in the series against the Hawks and the same was true for the series against the Wizards that possess one of the most athletic and efficient backcourts in the league in John Wall and Bradley Beal. George Hill does not seem to be at the same level as most of the point guards that are nowadays in the league; no offense to the ex-Spur but I would find it difficult to even consider him as a top-20 point guard. Three-point shooting was another thing that was killing the Pacers in the first round, where each player of the Hawks became suddenly a threat from the three-point line; in G5 of the series that gave temporarily the lead to Atlanta 3-2, the Hawks were shooting 56% from the three-point line and Mike Scott had 5/6. However, the Pacers that everybody is accusing unfairly found a way to win in the following two games and take the series 4-3. Do not forget that the 2008 NBA Champs Boston Celtics (66-16) of the Big Three (Allen, Pierce, Garnett) advanced to the second round with the same score 4-3 against the 8 seeded Atlanta Hawks (37-45).

There is also one more point that I have to make regarding the bad matchups the Pacers had in the first two rounds and is about the ‘bigs’ of the Wizards. Washington is a team that has been under the radar all season long mostly because of the injuries they had that constrained them to mediocrity. Wizards are a team that is loaded in every line, they have Wall, Beal and Ariza at backcourt and Nene and Gortat at frontcourt. This is a rare combination of capable guards, forwards and centers in today’s NBA; they can all score and defend but they lack in experience and star-power, which is an issue that will probably not bother them for long as Wall and Beal advance their game. The point that I am trying to make here is that Pacers are a team that relies on inside presence and against a team that has Nene and Gortat (both of them could easily be starters in any NBA team) it was not possible for them to take full advantage of their strength. However, again they were able to prevail and Hibbert that struggled badly in the first round played finally as an all-star (Games 2 & 4), while the other member of the Pacers frontcourt, David West, sealed the deal in Game 6 with 29 points.           

Focus

So, I argued in the previous paragraphs that the matchups of the first two rounds of the play-offs were not the best possible for the Pacers and they gave them a hard time. However, it was not only the matchups but it was also a matter of concentration. Indiana has shown two faces this season; the face of a team that it is focused and determined, until the All-Star break and a second face, the one that is showing until now, of a team that has lost its purpose and determination. I would also like to add to that second face the characteristic of eagerness, which I feel it describes in the best way the behaviour Indiana is showing on and off the court. In other words, the Pacers, I say, were focused and determined to become East’s number one and they showed to everybody until the All-Star break that they can be number one. After the All-Star break they became eager, which means that they reached a point where fighting for the first place in East was not enough; they wanted to get over with that and play against the Heat.

What I am saying is that because of their obsession to acquire home-court advantage against the Heat at the Eastern Conference Finals the Pacers reached a point during the last month of the regular season where they lost their focus. They became eager, regular season seemed to large, they lost an integral part of their team, a leader, in Danny Granger and in other words they wanted, if it was possible, to get to their destination without the journey. This is how, I think, the Pacers saw their opponents in the first two rounds of the play-offs; as a necessary evil on the way to their target. The Pacers suffered of what most of us suffer when we a set a goal and become obsessed with that; we are excited and determined at the beginning, but as time passes and our goal is still far away we get disheartened and lose focus. Most of us give up and never reach our goal, while others perceive the journey to our goal as boring and necessary task that we have to get over with and by the time we are there we have lost most if not all of our interest to the goal itself. There is, however, a small part of us that gets there and is either focused all along or reclaim its focus in the end and is able to accomplish the goal successfully. I think the Pacers belong in the last category and I see them regaining their concentration now that they reached their goal – of course I believe that their goal is to use their home-court advantage to advance to the NBA Finals and not just play against the Heat with a home-court advantage.     

Miami Heat or LeBron James Heat

So, even if the Pacers regain their concentration why are they going to beat the Heat four times? First of all, I believe that this going to be a very difficult task and they will definitely have to remain 100% focused and play their top game to accomplish it – we our talking about the two-times NBA Champs. But, I think that even though the way that the Heat advanced to the ECF gave them the opportunity to rest and have a fresher Dwyane Wade, which is always a positive thing, they have not been tested enough in this year’s play-offs. Their opponents were much weaker than them and did not challenge them enough, which is not always a good thing; Spurs woke up early in the first round, when the Mavs pushed them to 7 seven games and then they went on and destroyed the Blazers. We have not yet seen how this Heat team reacts with its back on the wall.

I would like to emphasize here that I am talking about this year’s Heat not last year’s championship team. I am saying this because this year’s Heat does not have Mike Miller, a player that made many crucial three-pointers for the Heat the past two-years and more importantly they have an older version of Shane Battier, Udonis Haslem and of course Wade. 2014 Heat is now truly James’ Heat. I listened to Charles Barkley talking about how much they relay on him and it is truly amazing but James leads the Heat in points, rebounds, assists and steals per game in the 2014 Play-offs!!! Miami, it seems to me that it has become from a big-three team to a team that relay’s alarmingly enough on the performance of one player. Consider that in the first two rounds LeBron had to play the Bobcats, against whom he scored 61 during the regular season and against an almost retired Paul Pierce (Kirilenko is not at the defensive level he used to be). Against the Pacers will have to face one of the finest young stars of the league in Paul George and a team that is going to make his life difficult close to basket. Is he going to be able to beat the Pacers all by himself? Does Miami have enough firepower to prevail over the Pacers? I don’t think so; they would need the resurrection of their bench and of Wade to do so.   

Frontcourt

Except of Miami’s lack of firepower, there is also their lack of capable ‘bigs’; where is Greg Oden? (great ‘what if’ matchup of the series Oden against Bynum…) Miami’s most reliable ‘big’ is ‘the Birdman’ Chris Andersen, in the sense that he plays as a ‘bigman’ while their most talented ‘bigman’ Chris Bosh has become more like new type of player that could be described as ‘wing-center’; a delicate power forward that plays center out of need and executes behind the tree-point line!!! This is what Bosh currently looks like and the weird thing is that he is such a talented player that plays great even in this awkward role. But, Indiana’s frontcourt is not the Bobcats’ frontcourt (even though I consider ‘Big-Al’ as a top-3 center in today’s NBA) or the Lopez-less Nets’ frontcourt.    

Indiana’s frontcourt I argue is and should be the main reason the Pacers are going to advance to the NBA Finals. They have two players, in Hibbert (it is time for him to play as an all-star for a whole series) and West that are capable both offensively and defensively, while the addition of Luis Scola makes them even stronger and experienced close to the basket. Adding to that frontcourt, Indiana’s backcourt (Hill and Watson will have a seemingly easier job against Chalmers and Cole) I think that Miami is going to be finally tested in this play-offs. Of course we should not overlook the individual matchups of Lance Stevenson against Wade and George against James, in which I expect Evan Turner to play an important role and probably make the difference coming from the bench (it is a great chance for him to show why Larry ‘Legend’ decided to trade his ex-franchise player and team-leader, Granger, to bring him to Indiana). 

Pacers have to

All in all I think that the Pacers, following the analysis of the previous paragraphs, have to win this series against Miami. I realize that there are a lot of ‘ifs’ included and how could this be any different when you are trying to forecast, but I believe that this is the series, in which the Pacers are going to get it together, realize that this what they were actually playing for the whole season and accomplish their target. If they fail they should consider serious changes during the summer, but I believe that instead this summer will be a period of changes for the Heat (I do not see LeBron going anywhere, not just yet). The final verdict: Pacers in either 6 or 7 games.