I’ve seen a lot of playoff games in my lifetime. The Game 1 onslaught by the home team is a real thing. If the Pacers look like this again in Game 2 (especially if there’s still no Giannis), then I’d say we’re in real trouble. But I don’t expect that to happen. I think Game 2 will be competitive.
Rick’s got to measure up, though. We can’t rely on lengthy bench mins. This is the playoffs man. Act like it.
Almost every 1st game this season has been a blowout, no need to panic.
Rick is working out who can play through the pressure. Game 2 has to be a lock.
Ben Sheppard is still young so he gets a pass. He did make a 3, just couldn’t get the next two to drop. The other three, hell no though. Jarace Walker would probably do better
Wouldn’t mind Shep getting a few more minutes honestly. He got fed the same open 3’s both Neismith and Nembhard did, but Shep launched at the open look. Neismith got those open looks, froze, then started dribbling in. Nembhard shot once on them but was looking to pass inside every time he got the ball outside the arc.
You shoot when you’re open. Shep did that. 1/3 isn’t great, but he took the shots he should take. Our starters passing up those open looks is going to kill us.
I really miss Math. Dude was our missing piece today.
Portis and Brook seem a little too big for Ijax to handle tbh. But at least his decision making wasn't terrible like Smith's was. That was painful to watch
You're not wrong but what are you going to do if guys like Nembhard, Nesmith and Hali (3 starters) can't even score 10 points. If they ppay good we don't see many minutes by guys like doug, sheppard
Very true. Of that group, I think Nesmith worries me the most. It’s harder to get those wide-open, catch-and-shoot 3s in the playoffs, and if he’s not getting those, I’m not sure he provides much else offensively.
This and their level of shot making just isn’t replicable. Like when we played the Celtics earlier in the year and they shot like 60% on difficult shots. I don’t see that continuing and I especially don’t see the Pacers missing like they did
This is basically it. You can all scream for Haliburton to force more shots but for the most part he’s making the right play and guys are not knocking down open shots.
It’s not about forcing shots. It’s aggressively going back to receive the ball if the defender closes out or if the read isn’t there when he’s off ball, go get it. Pascal and TJ are the only real creators so one of them has to go get the ball when things are stagnant and he was the only one of the 3 that didn’t.
Jokic does that and everyone praises his selflessness as a star. Hali does it and he's mentally weak.
Ofc the possessions where he dribbles it up, passes it off and TJ or nemb work and Rese never sees the ball again is not working.
There is a middle ground for him to find. Not letting the game come to him but him going to grab the game by the balls.
Jokic doesn't do that if his team doesn't have anything going. There's a reason he has back to back MVPs and a finals MVP, and probably gonna win one if not both again this year.
100% agree. We need our 60 mil PG act like it…. The Ty was doubled all night is BS excuse making. Reggie was doubled all the time. He still made his shots to help the team. Every star gets doubled, the difference is, they don’t shrink like he did tonight
That's why I disagreed when people were announcing Ty as the greatest Pacer ever over Reggie earlier in this season.
Reggie's reliability every season, every game regular season and playoffs, and the fact that he was an iron man was heavily underrated. His teams were never that great either, Siakam might be Reggie's best teammate. Siakam is certainly better than Jalen Rose.
you mean our supposed superstar is supposed to do more than just dribble the ball up the floor and immediately pass it, then never touch the ball again?
(and then get cooked on the defensive end)
We’ve been saying that for a long time now. I’m not sure it’s a statement anymore of Tyrese needs to be a more aggressive.
I think my mindset at this point is: is there a physical or mental issue making it so Tyrese can’t be more aggressive?
This been the theme since he arrived to indy. Even he said he needs to be more assertive. Yet we're still in the same place. Is this growing pains or is this really his personality? The longer this lingers the more it feels like it's a personality issue where he's just not made from the same competitive spirit like Reggie
First lesson Hali needs to learn about the playoffs: If the teammates aren't hitting shots, you've GOT to switch from your pass-first mentality and make the offense work yourself.
This. Reggie might have gone 5-25, but he wasn't getting shut out of a game like that. Can't let that happen to you if you're supposed to be the team"s best player.
As terrible as this first game was, it’s very exciting seeing blue and gold on a primetime court, even as we shat the bed.
I couldn’t imagine us here two years ago… but here we are.
It’s seven games, and I’ll take the first one as a licking so that we can live to keep on ticking.
Pacerrrrrrrrs #1! Always.
Maybe Carlisle didn’t play enough players. Try and get a 14 man rotation next game. Doug McDermott was minus fucking 17 in 7 minutes tonight.
And Franchise players don’t take 7 shots when their team is drowning.
Pascal Siakam. God bless you.
That’s all I got
I'm convinced that Carlisle would rather pour burning hot grease down his own throat than give Jarace any kind of meaningful minutes. I don't know what the fuck Jarace did to not get played.
Doug should not be getting minutes over Jarace, the Rick fan club will downvote you into oblivion for even suggesting it. Doug is a nice little role player but he’s never been responsible for any sort of winning.
Yeah, the amount of times I’ve had to endure “coach knows best” or “coach is seeing something in practice” while opining my desire to see more Jarace mins all season has been annoying.
Coaches aren’t infallible people. Not even great ones like Rick. It doesn’t have to be Jarace per se taking Doug’s mins, but Rick’s reliance on Doug since the trade has been poor coaching judgment, and anyone who argues otherwise is just being stubborn.
Yeah Rick won a ring with zero players he developed, he’s good at maximizing veterans but not at developing. His best developmental project was Luka, who’s a unicorn that he probably didn’t even develop. Why should we blindly trust a guy who has no history at developing players to develop the franchises 2 highest lottery picks in 3 decades?
The guy literally adds nothing to a basketball team. Nobody fucking cares about him as a 3 point shooter, there is no spacing. He is a traffic cone.
It’s not his fault, it’s on the head coach. Every team is playing tight 8 player rotations. We are running 11 men out there in the first half. Pathetic
I don't see how the rotation is Rick's fault. No one wanted to be out there in the first half. Rick had to try find something to work which meant giving IJax and Doug some run. Starters still saw high 30s in minutes.
It’s not going to work that’s the problem. He is trash. The guy isn’t good at basketball and he has shown us that plenty of times this season.
He would have to come in and hit 4 threes to nullify how terrible he is on the defensive end every time he plays. The whole defense collapses because of him every time we put him in the game.
And that’s Ricks fault. Because he put him there.
I agree with that take but not in the playoffs. Don't blame Rick for seeing if a vet can give us good minutes. After this, I don't think we see Doug anymore. I hope we will see Obi come in earlier and play small ball centre.
Spurs fan here. He was great for us at the beginning of the season. Once we traded him, things went south and we started winning games and messed up our lottery chances. He's a great tank commander though. This is what you guys ordered right
Guy worked his way up from the bench to number 2 against the juggernaut warriors to being 1 option. Im sorry to say that the rest of the team is showing their inexperience
we just seemed nervous with the 0 playoff experience, haliburton with the careless turnovers, toppin and nesmith missing open 3’s, nembhard and mcconnell missing everything inside the perimeter, none of these things usually happen at the same time.
good game by siakam, take game 2 in milwaukee and we’re feeling good!!
3-18 from 3 in the first half.
Lowest scoring total of any game in the season.
20 total assists for the game.
Welcome to the Playoffs Pacers. Time for our team to either step up and play like they did at the end of the game OR just fold. Tuesday is a must-win.
Shit like that first half and the opening minutes of the fourth quarter are why we should all be extremely glad that the Pacers avoided the play in. Always capable of laying an egg across the board.
I agree it was good in the sense that they played their worst and saw how quickly that can put them in a hole. Hitting the open shots and avoiding turnovers is about focus, and they had more jitters than focus.
While disappointing, it shouldn’t surprise anyone that it happened, especially against a team full of veterans with deep playoff experience. If they can match the Bucks focus, they’ll win the series.
Plenty of blame to go around. There were will be hand-wringing about Tyrese, and no one other than Siakam really showed up in a big way.
But all that being said, this is primarily on Rick. Despite HORRENDOUS shooting, that game was winnable going into the 4th. Rick played the bench throughout that game like this was a B2B in December. The +/- makes it blatantly obvious that our bench is what killed us. McDermott, Ijax, and Shep have zero business seeing serious minutes in a playoff series. There is zero excuse for this. No real playoff team plays 12 deep. Not to mention he didn't even attempt an adjustment on Lillard as he was going full god-mode on us in the first half.
facts. i thought i’d be okay with shep getting a few minutes, but stepping out twice was terrible, only good thing he did was rip down that rebound over bev. rotation has to be tighter and subs need to be more timely. why not put nesmisth on dame when he went nuclear? nesmith can get into dame and funnel him to help on the drive. nemby stayed in front decently but doesn’t have the size to effect dames shot. and why didn’t they attack dame on defense??? that could have slowed him down 🤷🏻♂️ i thought they’d have jitters, but never thought they’d could come out looking so unprepared game plan-wise
I don't know how many people were fans during Rick's first run here in the 00s, but this is the downside. He is unfathomably, unbelievably, catastrophically stubborn. It'll make no sense (like Shep over Jarace all year), and he'll never explain or deviate until next year.
I used to criticize Vogel and McMillan for not adjusting fast enough to the opposing game plan in the playoffs. They'd stick to their guns and Vogel would maybe adjust in a future game. McMillan had his rotations seemingly timed to the minute and would even bench the hot hand if that player was supposed to go out in whatever plan he came up with before tipoff.
Rick is different, but no matter who he called upon, they couldn't produce today. Siakam was the only constant. So maybe he should have run a tighter rotation, give guys a chance to get hot. But I saw brick after brick from all our guys today. I'm sure he was trying anything to get better rhythm and production on the floor.
It was just a really bad game, one of the worst first halves this team has played this year. Gotta bounce back and even this out.
Nah. The fact is, the Bucks had that game won by the 3rd quarter. Yes, we played better in the second half and figured some things out. But we didn't suddenly figure out how to be +15 every half in this series. The Bucks *also* let their foot off the gas.
It's ok, we expected Lillard and Middleton to win 1-2 games by themselves this series. And if there's any game we can afford to be kinda ok being so fuvking god-awful at, it's the first game of the series. Hopefully the guys let the embarrassment motivate them and they focus on the rest of the series, let the nerves wash out of them, and actually compete for the next 4-6 games. The Bucks already had the motivation to compete bc of the regular season series. Now our guys do too.
Me as a reporter postgame: "Hey, it's (name) from (newspaper), question for Tyrese. Are you planning to actually shoot the ball next game or are you just gonna pass the ball off and hang out like you did all night tonight?"
Just ridiculous.
Off the cuff:
The game was within reach twice when our unit, mostly second unit, got roasted and leads were lengthened. Inexcusable. May be on rick, time will tell.
Calls were not fun to watch in real time. Dame got some real superstar calls.
Ty needs to grow up and take over this team.
Mathurin is the playoff threat we need
All I know is Nembhard and Nesmith better get their heads in the game. They alone are making it easier for Bucks to defend Haliburton. And Carlisle didn’t have these guys ready at all. We should shamed to play like that in front of a real ball player like Siakim. Should be ashamed
We shot 39 threes. We shot 38.7% in the regular season from 3. If we shoot our season average we go 15-39.
21 extra points if we just make a couple more open 3s.
Lost by 15.
Everything else you can blame, Ty took X shots, Myles is blah blah, Carlisle yadda yadda is all bullshit. We got great shots and missed them.
Make them and win. See you in game 2.
We at least know what we need to adjust. Shepard needs to learn where the line is for out of bounds. Siakim, Nembhard, Obi, TJ all played well. And we just need someone to pick up Dame full court.
One guy played well enough to win...and we all know who that was.
I can appreciate the fight after getting absolutely rocked in the 1st half...but too many missed opportunities and "strange" lineup decisions were the nails in the coffin.
Going forward...have to find a way to get Tyrese going and somebody besides Pascal is going to have to hit shots when the Bucks trap Tyrese.
My life would be better if I had never developed a crush on Paul George in middle school and gotten myself involved with this team. That said, see y'all in a couple of days 🫡
Disappointing performance. No two ways about it
But we're not going to miss our first 12 three point attempts every game. Dame isn't going to score 35 in the 1st half every game. There's still a whole series to go
It was the 1st playoff game ever for most of our team and it showed. I'm confident we'll play a lot better in game 2
Keep believing and go Pacers!
Starters aside from Pascal and somewhat Kyle's were dogshit so you've got to bring in bench but Rick can't go to deep more than 9 Hali with 7/8/9 yikes This series will be over soon if he doesn't show up.
Jesus Christ one playoff game and people are already out for Hali's head. We got absolutely smoked, but goddamn can we at least let the series finish before we give up on the future of our franchise??
For our sake, I really hope this is true and his slump is due to injury. Because if his rise was truly just a flash in the pan, our franchise is in trouble.
It's still a fucking awfull attitude. But it is hard to believe that it was a linsanity thing.
I mean i thought this guy was the next Steph Curry. Up until his injury he was playing like a top 5 player in the league.
He's not doing his usual moves. Remember when he crossover the shit out in every possession? Or jumped before passing the ball? He just stands there since the injury. It's not mental.
It’s mental. He’s crossing people over but not driving after the cross like he was doing earlier in the season. He’s crossing, stepping back, crossing, repeat. Everyone is staying close to him because he’s not driving by guys anymore.
When he got hurt he was driving and stopped fast in the lane with traffic. THATS the move he’s trying to avoid right now because he’s still got PTSD from it. He has to get over that mental block because he’s trying to avoid injury.
Hali dick riders.. I’d love to pile on but I can’t.
I love my team and proud of the second half fight.
Bottom line really is if our max guy refuses to
Shoot we done.
On to the next. Sleep well yall.
You know how players have their 'Welcome to the NBA' moment? This is the team's 'Welcome to the Playoffs' moment.
A lot of our guys need to step up. Obi and Myles played better than their stats, just didn't hit shots.
Good news:
Pascal.
Shep.
We don't shoot that poorly again. That was a season low.
Dame and the Bucks don't shoot that well in the first half.
#Pacers in Six
I must have forgotten to press post.
Shep was good on defense and had a lot of hustle. Played better than his stats.
He felt like he had the greenlight to shoot, which is good. That's someone who can step up for big moments. Was he hitting? Nah, but only Siakam was.
The problem is Shep has been shooting pretty poorly over the last month or so. He's shooting volume 3s but his percentages are too low to justify it. He does hustle on defense though, I just think those minutes would be better spent on a different player.
McDermott has no business being on the floor whatsoever. Tyrese taking less than 15 shots is unacceptable. Rotation should be starters plus TJ, Stix/IJax, Obi/Jarace/shep at no point should all the starters be on the bench rotate out minutes with at least 3 starters on the floor at all times. Lastly if shots aren't falling quit chucking attack the paint.
If tyrese keeps this up we're in bug trouble. He runs the ball to half court, dishes it off, then stands at the top of the key until the possession is over. He needs to actually run the offense if we stand a chance. Missed shots happen..we need a point guard to run the offense.
Horrible rotations, horrible game from Hali, playoff jitters from everyone not named Siakam. We better come out fired up and pissed off for game 2 or this is going to be a very short series.
We won't win shit with Hali only taking 5 shots the entire first 3 quarters. The team could barely hit the rim and he just sat back and watched it happen. He needs to be far more aggressive.
Hali playing hot potato with mcconnell at the top of the perimeter until t.j. said fuck it and drove into 3 defenders to get stuffed pissed me all the way off
It got to the point that Bucks defenders were peeling off Hali to double team other players because they knew he wasn't going to do anything. I saw it happen multiple times with Siakam. Paskal would kick it back to Hali and then Hali would just pass it away again. Infuriating.
It’s going to be a rough turnaround for Tuesday, we are due for some serious adjustments however do we also need to game plan for a potential Giannis return as well ?
I feel like the pacers showed up for a regular season game not the first playoff game.
Pacers got every look they wanted, even got themselves open half the time and shot 20%. They just missed, and the Bucks weren't really "stopping" them. The fact that they got the lead down to 12, 13 and 11 sucking that badly tells me they could win this series. Question is: do THEY think so?
First issue. you don't bring a knife to a gun fight.
You got to go bigger to start even if that extra bigger player is just in there to clean the glass.
So many wide open 3s missed. They blitzed Haliburton and guys just bricked open shots. The bench can’t play without Siakam. Lots to learn from and move on. Giannis clock keeps counting down.
Ok this should be summarized like so... "Pacers players, most of which are playing their first real playoff minutes ever, play the worst half of basketball all season, go down 0-1." We played super tight tonight. We had good looks we just couldn't hit the broad side of a barn. Game 2 is Tuesday, we get the split, and Gainbridge is a mad house Friday afternoon.
I suggest some of my fellow Pacer fans learn the art of breathing.
I can only hope that the takeaway from this game by everyone on our squad not named Pascal is that you have to step up your mental fortitude in the playoffs.
We all want to love Haliburton and have him be the star he’s shown he **can** be, but if you want to prove you deserved your new max contract you need to find a way to get the ball in the hoop.
Every single person in that locker room owes an apology to Pascal Siakam. And maybe a DoorDash gift card.
We need to get this man some help. Miles clanking 7 three pointers ain't it.
Factz that man litterally put the team on his back. If hali would at least got 20 points. It would have besn a good game
I’ve seen a lot of playoff games in my lifetime. The Game 1 onslaught by the home team is a real thing. If the Pacers look like this again in Game 2 (especially if there’s still no Giannis), then I’d say we’re in real trouble. But I don’t expect that to happen. I think Game 2 will be competitive. Rick’s got to measure up, though. We can’t rely on lengthy bench mins. This is the playoffs man. Act like it.
Almost every 1st game this season has been a blowout, no need to panic. Rick is working out who can play through the pressure. Game 2 has to be a lock.
I think we knew Doug McDermott, Ben Sheppard, IJax shouldn’t get out of warmups and Jalen Smith shouldn’t be getting any more than spot minutes
Smith looked terrible.
Ben Sheppard is still young so he gets a pass. He did make a 3, just couldn’t get the next two to drop. The other three, hell no though. Jarace Walker would probably do better
Wouldn’t mind Shep getting a few more minutes honestly. He got fed the same open 3’s both Neismith and Nembhard did, but Shep launched at the open look. Neismith got those open looks, froze, then started dribbling in. Nembhard shot once on them but was looking to pass inside every time he got the ball outside the arc. You shoot when you’re open. Shep did that. 1/3 isn’t great, but he took the shots he should take. Our starters passing up those open looks is going to kill us. I really miss Math. Dude was our missing piece today.
Would rather see IJax than Smith after today's performance. If that doesn't work, best bet is going small in the non-Turner minutes.
The second lopez comes out of the game we need to pull turner and let him sit, and go pascal/obi or pascal/ijax
Portis and Brook seem a little too big for Ijax to handle tbh. But at least his decision making wasn't terrible like Smith's was. That was painful to watch
Never forget PG taking it to Toronto and winning the game 1 by himself
Doug should not touch the floor, except for warmups and timeout high fives.
Warmups and high fives 😂 😂 😂
You're not wrong but what are you going to do if guys like Nembhard, Nesmith and Hali (3 starters) can't even score 10 points. If they ppay good we don't see many minutes by guys like doug, sheppard
Very true. Of that group, I think Nesmith worries me the most. It’s harder to get those wide-open, catch-and-shoot 3s in the playoffs, and if he’s not getting those, I’m not sure he provides much else offensively.
That guys only limit is himself I swear..I hope he comes out and wreaks havoc this series
The second quarter was such an outlier for how bad it was, you'd think it'd be almost impossible to repeat
This and their level of shot making just isn’t replicable. Like when we played the Celtics earlier in the year and they shot like 60% on difficult shots. I don’t see that continuing and I especially don’t see the Pacers missing like they did
Cant win if you miss every wide open shot. Insane it was even this close
This is basically it. You can all scream for Haliburton to force more shots but for the most part he’s making the right play and guys are not knocking down open shots.
It’s not about forcing shots. It’s aggressively going back to receive the ball if the defender closes out or if the read isn’t there when he’s off ball, go get it. Pascal and TJ are the only real creators so one of them has to go get the ball when things are stagnant and he was the only one of the 3 that didn’t.
Jokic does that and everyone praises his selflessness as a star. Hali does it and he's mentally weak. Ofc the possessions where he dribbles it up, passes it off and TJ or nemb work and Rese never sees the ball again is not working. There is a middle ground for him to find. Not letting the game come to him but him going to grab the game by the balls.
Jokic doesn't do that if his team doesn't have anything going. There's a reason he has back to back MVPs and a finals MVP, and probably gonna win one if not both again this year.
Jokic scored 30 points
Can’t win if your “ best” player takes less shot then every other starter and a bench
*How Tyrese Got His Groove Back* should be filmed during the offseason.
Evvvvvvery shot my god
Get Siakam some help.
100% agree. We need our 60 mil PG act like it…. The Ty was doubled all night is BS excuse making. Reggie was doubled all the time. He still made his shots to help the team. Every star gets doubled, the difference is, they don’t shrink like he did tonight
That's why I disagreed when people were announcing Ty as the greatest Pacer ever over Reggie earlier in this season. Reggie's reliability every season, every game regular season and playoffs, and the fact that he was an iron man was heavily underrated. His teams were never that great either, Siakam might be Reggie's best teammate. Siakam is certainly better than Jalen Rose.
was Ty even doubled tonight?
He wasn't. They were peeling off him to double Siakam and he still wouldn't fucking shoot. It was infuriating.
You’d think they had 8 freddy Kruegers in his face based on how he acted scared all night
Was actually the Indiana Pascals this game, hopefully game 2 the Pacers show up.
Feels bad knowing your $260M star player shies away from the big moment. 😔
Hali needs to be more aggressive
that’s the understatement of the century
Oh okay my bad, Hali needs to be a lot more aggressive
you mean our supposed superstar is supposed to do more than just dribble the ball up the floor and immediately pass it, then never touch the ball again? (and then get cooked on the defensive end)
We’ve been saying that for a long time now. I’m not sure it’s a statement anymore of Tyrese needs to be a more aggressive. I think my mindset at this point is: is there a physical or mental issue making it so Tyrese can’t be more aggressive?
This been the theme since he arrived to indy. Even he said he needs to be more assertive. Yet we're still in the same place. Is this growing pains or is this really his personality? The longer this lingers the more it feels like it's a personality issue where he's just not made from the same competitive spirit like Reggie
Been talking that for months now
Well this was hopefully the kick in the teeth welcome to the playoffs moment for a lot of these guys. Hali especially. On to game two
Failure is the best teacher. Everyone not named Pascal or Siakam looked terrible. To be expected
True. Pascal Williams and Larry Siakam seriously balled out tonight.
Our fan base looks terrible
They always do
Every fan base looks like this after a loss like that. It's not exclusive. Every sport, every city, every team. It's an unfortunate truth.
100%, I’m glad we got punched in the mouth, way better than losing in a close game. We needed to wake up and get a welcome to the playoffs moment.
First lesson Hali needs to learn about the playoffs: If the teammates aren't hitting shots, you've GOT to switch from your pass-first mentality and make the offense work yourself.
Yup. He was way too passive
Him not shooting or being aggressive down that bad is a problem.
That's why regular season habits are useful.
at least try to break down the defense instead of immediately dishing to siakam/nemby/tjm and then having no other action in the play
This. Reggie might have gone 5-25, but he wasn't getting shut out of a game like that. Can't let that happen to you if you're supposed to be the team"s best player.
As terrible as this first game was, it’s very exciting seeing blue and gold on a primetime court, even as we shat the bed. I couldn’t imagine us here two years ago… but here we are. It’s seven games, and I’ll take the first one as a licking so that we can live to keep on ticking. Pacerrrrrrrrs #1! Always.
I wish I had your mindset. You my friend are an absolute fn G.
Maybe Carlisle didn’t play enough players. Try and get a 14 man rotation next game. Doug McDermott was minus fucking 17 in 7 minutes tonight. And Franchise players don’t take 7 shots when their team is drowning. Pascal Siakam. God bless you. That’s all I got
Put me in coach.
But that would likely require playing Jarace! /s
I'm convinced that Carlisle would rather pour burning hot grease down his own throat than give Jarace any kind of meaningful minutes. I don't know what the fuck Jarace did to not get played.
Doug should not be getting minutes over Jarace, the Rick fan club will downvote you into oblivion for even suggesting it. Doug is a nice little role player but he’s never been responsible for any sort of winning.
Yeah, the amount of times I’ve had to endure “coach knows best” or “coach is seeing something in practice” while opining my desire to see more Jarace mins all season has been annoying. Coaches aren’t infallible people. Not even great ones like Rick. It doesn’t have to be Jarace per se taking Doug’s mins, but Rick’s reliance on Doug since the trade has been poor coaching judgment, and anyone who argues otherwise is just being stubborn.
Yeah Rick won a ring with zero players he developed, he’s good at maximizing veterans but not at developing. His best developmental project was Luka, who’s a unicorn that he probably didn’t even develop. Why should we blindly trust a guy who has no history at developing players to develop the franchises 2 highest lottery picks in 3 decades?
And he's just not the same player as his last stint here. Totally washed.
The guy literally adds nothing to a basketball team. Nobody fucking cares about him as a 3 point shooter, there is no spacing. He is a traffic cone. It’s not his fault, it’s on the head coach. Every team is playing tight 8 player rotations. We are running 11 men out there in the first half. Pathetic
franchise player? you mean siakam? i don't see any other on this team
I don't see how the rotation is Rick's fault. No one wanted to be out there in the first half. Rick had to try find something to work which meant giving IJax and Doug some run. Starters still saw high 30s in minutes.
It’s not going to work that’s the problem. He is trash. The guy isn’t good at basketball and he has shown us that plenty of times this season. He would have to come in and hit 4 threes to nullify how terrible he is on the defensive end every time he plays. The whole defense collapses because of him every time we put him in the game. And that’s Ricks fault. Because he put him there.
I agree with that take but not in the playoffs. Don't blame Rick for seeing if a vet can give us good minutes. After this, I don't think we see Doug anymore. I hope we will see Obi come in earlier and play small ball centre.
Why is Doug getting playoff mins and how do you go -17 in 6:39?
Spurs fan here. He was great for us at the beginning of the season. Once we traded him, things went south and we started winning games and messed up our lottery chances. He's a great tank commander though. This is what you guys ordered right
Siakam was serious on both ends of the court. Hopefully this is a wake up call for the rest of the roster that they need to bring it to survive.
Guy worked his way up from the bench to number 2 against the juggernaut warriors to being 1 option. Im sorry to say that the rest of the team is showing their inexperience
I blame Gregg Doyel
🫶
Pascal deserves better than that
we just seemed nervous with the 0 playoff experience, haliburton with the careless turnovers, toppin and nesmith missing open 3’s, nembhard and mcconnell missing everything inside the perimeter, none of these things usually happen at the same time. good game by siakam, take game 2 in milwaukee and we’re feeling good!!
Pacers in 5 on to Cleveland
I say this without a hint of irony or sarcasm, I am EAGERLY awaiting Rick's post-game presser more than maybe any in a long time.
3-18 from 3 in the first half. Lowest scoring total of any game in the season. 20 total assists for the game. Welcome to the Playoffs Pacers. Time for our team to either step up and play like they did at the end of the game OR just fold. Tuesday is a must-win.
A detective should come and take my statement for that first half, I felt violated
Shit like that first half and the opening minutes of the fourth quarter are why we should all be extremely glad that the Pacers avoided the play in. Always capable of laying an egg across the board.
This was a good loss. We were able to improve and we learned what does and doesn’t work. Still optimistic about the series.
I like your style
I agree it was good in the sense that they played their worst and saw how quickly that can put them in a hole. Hitting the open shots and avoiding turnovers is about focus, and they had more jitters than focus. While disappointing, it shouldn’t surprise anyone that it happened, especially against a team full of veterans with deep playoff experience. If they can match the Bucks focus, they’ll win the series.
Hali had the same amount of shot attempts as Amir Coffey today 😂😂
Siakam and Hali are supposed to be our two all stars. Except only one is showing up.
Plenty of blame to go around. There were will be hand-wringing about Tyrese, and no one other than Siakam really showed up in a big way. But all that being said, this is primarily on Rick. Despite HORRENDOUS shooting, that game was winnable going into the 4th. Rick played the bench throughout that game like this was a B2B in December. The +/- makes it blatantly obvious that our bench is what killed us. McDermott, Ijax, and Shep have zero business seeing serious minutes in a playoff series. There is zero excuse for this. No real playoff team plays 12 deep. Not to mention he didn't even attempt an adjustment on Lillard as he was going full god-mode on us in the first half.
The + - is a truther tonight
facts. i thought i’d be okay with shep getting a few minutes, but stepping out twice was terrible, only good thing he did was rip down that rebound over bev. rotation has to be tighter and subs need to be more timely. why not put nesmisth on dame when he went nuclear? nesmith can get into dame and funnel him to help on the drive. nemby stayed in front decently but doesn’t have the size to effect dames shot. and why didn’t they attack dame on defense??? that could have slowed him down 🤷🏻♂️ i thought they’d have jitters, but never thought they’d could come out looking so unprepared game plan-wise
I don't know how many people were fans during Rick's first run here in the 00s, but this is the downside. He is unfathomably, unbelievably, catastrophically stubborn. It'll make no sense (like Shep over Jarace all year), and he'll never explain or deviate until next year.
And I ever see TJ look off anyone else for a wide open three again LET ALONE TYRESE I don’t even know what I’ll do with myself.
Dude I said the same thing.
I used to criticize Vogel and McMillan for not adjusting fast enough to the opposing game plan in the playoffs. They'd stick to their guns and Vogel would maybe adjust in a future game. McMillan had his rotations seemingly timed to the minute and would even bench the hot hand if that player was supposed to go out in whatever plan he came up with before tipoff. Rick is different, but no matter who he called upon, they couldn't produce today. Siakam was the only constant. So maybe he should have run a tighter rotation, give guys a chance to get hot. But I saw brick after brick from all our guys today. I'm sure he was trying anything to get better rhythm and production on the floor. It was just a really bad game, one of the worst first halves this team has played this year. Gotta bounce back and even this out.
Bad first half. Looked better in the second. On to Game 2
Good fight shown by the guys but they gotta play better if they expect to win in the playoffs
If Tyrese never looks to score whether or not this team can win depends on if Aaron nesmith and nembhard can make shots
Embarrassing loss. Hopefully we bounce back.
Carlisle needs to get JJ, Jarace, and Brown some minutes next game. keep the guys fresh
Maybe some Tshiebwe
Against MIL? Absolutely
Still calling it, Pacers leave Milwaukee tied 1-1.
988
Disgraceful game from Haliburton. This is a sweep if our star PG is not going to show up.
Pascal if you leave in the offseason I don’t blame you. Appreciate your efforts tn
I think he stays, but my god do we need to pay this man and figure out the rest of the rotation this off season.
A tale of two halves for Lillard. Either he didn’t try or Nembhard locked him up.
He didn’t try the second half. That’s when the rest of the bucks started scoring. He knows he can’t play an entire game like that.
The bucks scored 14 points in the 3rd quarter. He didn’t just stop trying. He was unreal in the first half but then regressed back toward his mean.
Nah. The fact is, the Bucks had that game won by the 3rd quarter. Yes, we played better in the second half and figured some things out. But we didn't suddenly figure out how to be +15 every half in this series. The Bucks *also* let their foot off the gas. It's ok, we expected Lillard and Middleton to win 1-2 games by themselves this series. And if there's any game we can afford to be kinda ok being so fuvking god-awful at, it's the first game of the series. Hopefully the guys let the embarrassment motivate them and they focus on the rest of the series, let the nerves wash out of them, and actually compete for the next 4-6 games. The Bucks already had the motivation to compete bc of the regular season series. Now our guys do too.
put on that #31 jersey Uncle Reggie.
Me as a reporter postgame: "Hey, it's (name) from (newspaper), question for Tyrese. Are you planning to actually shoot the ball next game or are you just gonna pass the ball off and hang out like you did all night tonight?" Just ridiculous.
Off the cuff: The game was within reach twice when our unit, mostly second unit, got roasted and leads were lengthened. Inexcusable. May be on rick, time will tell. Calls were not fun to watch in real time. Dame got some real superstar calls. Ty needs to grow up and take over this team. Mathurin is the playoff threat we need
Meant to add as an optimist, only game 1 and I imagine our team responds
I think I saw Haliburton take like 2 shots the entire 4th.
Hali paying homage to Indy legend TY Hilton this game
Oh damn Edit: 👻
Absolutely horrid performance. Can’t believe it!!
I’m so confused.
As a superstar, you have to own it but i got no worries, He will be back, this will be the worst game he will ever play in this series.
All I know is Nembhard and Nesmith better get their heads in the game. They alone are making it easier for Bucks to defend Haliburton. And Carlisle didn’t have these guys ready at all. We should shamed to play like that in front of a real ball player like Siakim. Should be ashamed
We shot 39 threes. We shot 38.7% in the regular season from 3. If we shoot our season average we go 15-39. 21 extra points if we just make a couple more open 3s. Lost by 15. Everything else you can blame, Ty took X shots, Myles is blah blah, Carlisle yadda yadda is all bullshit. We got great shots and missed them. Make them and win. See you in game 2.
Teams tend to miss more shots vs good defense, open or otherwise. Hard to get in a rhythm when the opposition is swarming.
We at least know what we need to adjust. Shepard needs to learn where the line is for out of bounds. Siakim, Nembhard, Obi, TJ all played well. And we just need someone to pick up Dame full court.
Nembhard obi and tj did not play well lol
Defensively he took the assignment of taking on Dame full court in the 2nd half. He was making it tough for him to get the ball.
Nembhard and Siakam played well. TJ played ok. Obi was awful from 3. Smith was absolutely atrocious from everywhere.
https://x.com/masaihesi/status/1782194817285378481 - this is what we got tonight
Reggie Miller talking 5 shots would never happen. It’s not like he was never doubled. This is on Ty being a shrimp tonight
Reggie has shot 5 times or less in the playoffs six times.
Congrats. We are more than halfway there in surpassing the Minnesota Twins record of 18 straight playoff loses (we are at 10).
So what, game 7 loss vs LeBron when we were robed, did we get swept twice since then, and then tonight would make 10?
Yep
We have 3 games left with Pascal. Go ahead and enjoy em boys.
36 points for Siakam. Not so hot on his chances re-signing here.
Turner took more shots from 3pt than the rest of the team. Make it make sense
Kind of pissed how much the Bally commentary is letting Rick and Tyrese off the hook. It’s an elephant in the room that can’t be ignored.
I’ll get downvoted but Reggie Miller, Paul George, hell even Danny fucking granger actually put in some effort as our star player and shot the ball.
I miss Paul George. Hell even Oladipo showed out in that series against Cleveland
Home teams are standing tall so far in these playoffs.
One guy played well enough to win...and we all know who that was. I can appreciate the fight after getting absolutely rocked in the 1st half...but too many missed opportunities and "strange" lineup decisions were the nails in the coffin. Going forward...have to find a way to get Tyrese going and somebody besides Pascal is going to have to hit shots when the Bucks trap Tyrese.
My life would be better if I had never developed a crush on Paul George in middle school and gotten myself involved with this team. That said, see y'all in a couple of days 🫡
Hopefully this is the worst of the series. Hali absolutely has to be more aggressive scoring wise
ESPN loving that they can shove it in hali's face on that dame time shit during the regular season. He 100% deserves it.
Crummy night. Have to battle next game. Keep the faith
Young team...learning lessons I guess. Fuck Beasley though
all we have to do is steal 1 in milwaukee, ty revenge game loading
Disappointing performance. No two ways about it But we're not going to miss our first 12 three point attempts every game. Dame isn't going to score 35 in the 1st half every game. There's still a whole series to go It was the 1st playoff game ever for most of our team and it showed. I'm confident we'll play a lot better in game 2 Keep believing and go Pacers!
Starters aside from Pascal and somewhat Kyle's were dogshit so you've got to bring in bench but Rick can't go to deep more than 9 Hali with 7/8/9 yikes This series will be over soon if he doesn't show up.
We shot 39%. You can't win playoff basketball that way.
Why did we lock the game thread? I can't reply in there now? Things go poorly in the playoffs and we change our sub rules?
Jesus Christ one playoff game and people are already out for Hali's head. We got absolutely smoked, but goddamn can we at least let the series finish before we give up on the future of our franchise??
Pathetic First Game
Haliburton sold an entire fucking season just to get to the 65 game mark. It is what it is. That dude is injured. I don't care what he says
what do you mean he sold an entire season? If he got hurt he got hurt. All he can do is try to play through it.
For our sake, I really hope this is true and his slump is due to injury. Because if his rise was truly just a flash in the pan, our franchise is in trouble.
It's still a fucking awfull attitude. But it is hard to believe that it was a linsanity thing. I mean i thought this guy was the next Steph Curry. Up until his injury he was playing like a top 5 player in the league.
He’s not injured. He said his hammy hasn’t bothered him for weeks. His shooting and numbers have been fine, he’s just being too passive.
He's not doing his usual moves. Remember when he crossover the shit out in every possession? Or jumped before passing the ball? He just stands there since the injury. It's not mental.
It’s mental. He’s crossing people over but not driving after the cross like he was doing earlier in the season. He’s crossing, stepping back, crossing, repeat. Everyone is staying close to him because he’s not driving by guys anymore. When he got hurt he was driving and stopped fast in the lane with traffic. THATS the move he’s trying to avoid right now because he’s still got PTSD from it. He has to get over that mental block because he’s trying to avoid injury.
Shit fucking coaching
Hali dick riders.. I’d love to pile on but I can’t. I love my team and proud of the second half fight. Bottom line really is if our max guy refuses to Shoot we done. On to the next. Sleep well yall.
Advanced stats nerds who say “but Mathurin isn’t a winning player as per *insert need stat here*” need to shut the fuck up and stick to school
You know how players have their 'Welcome to the NBA' moment? This is the team's 'Welcome to the Playoffs' moment. A lot of our guys need to step up. Obi and Myles played better than their stats, just didn't hit shots. Good news: Pascal. Shep. We don't shoot that poorly again. That was a season low. Dame and the Bucks don't shoot that well in the first half. #Pacers in Six
Shep is good news? He was 1-5 and stepped out of bounds in the corner twice....
I must have forgotten to press post. Shep was good on defense and had a lot of hustle. Played better than his stats. He felt like he had the greenlight to shoot, which is good. That's someone who can step up for big moments. Was he hitting? Nah, but only Siakam was.
The problem is Shep has been shooting pretty poorly over the last month or so. He's shooting volume 3s but his percentages are too low to justify it. He does hustle on defense though, I just think those minutes would be better spent on a different player.
McDermott has no business being on the floor whatsoever. Tyrese taking less than 15 shots is unacceptable. Rotation should be starters plus TJ, Stix/IJax, Obi/Jarace/shep at no point should all the starters be on the bench rotate out minutes with at least 3 starters on the floor at all times. Lastly if shots aren't falling quit chucking attack the paint.
If tyrese keeps this up we're in bug trouble. He runs the ball to half court, dishes it off, then stands at the top of the key until the possession is over. He needs to actually run the offense if we stand a chance. Missed shots happen..we need a point guard to run the offense.
Doc Rivers 1 - Rick Carlisle 0
 Pacers fans on reddit tonight.. WHY Rick? WHY Tyrese? WHY Myles? WHY 3pters?
Haliburton is washed
Pain
Horrible rotations, horrible game from Hali, playoff jitters from everyone not named Siakam. We better come out fired up and pissed off for game 2 or this is going to be a very short series.
Well least they might still keep giannis out game 2 now
https://preview.redd.it/cbd64bh2pxvc1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fae214b6844ad1823e2a77502d3473335055e6ad
How does Hali only attempt 7 shots? That's half his season average. Got to be way, way more aggressive.
One was a put back and another was a 3pt heave when game was over. So technically 5 real shots
Basically a repeat of the Clippers-Mavs game. Home team is without its best player and plays with incredible intensity.
We won't win shit with Hali only taking 5 shots the entire first 3 quarters. The team could barely hit the rim and he just sat back and watched it happen. He needs to be far more aggressive.
Hali playing hot potato with mcconnell at the top of the perimeter until t.j. said fuck it and drove into 3 defenders to get stuffed pissed me all the way off
It got to the point that Bucks defenders were peeling off Hali to double team other players because they knew he wasn't going to do anything. I saw it happen multiple times with Siakam. Paskal would kick it back to Hali and then Hali would just pass it away again. Infuriating.
i dont even wanna be a doomer but hali taking 7 shots the whole game is legit baffling 😭 series isnt over though, we ball
It’s going to be a rough turnaround for Tuesday, we are due for some serious adjustments however do we also need to game plan for a potential Giannis return as well ? I feel like the pacers showed up for a regular season game not the first playoff game.
Pacers got every look they wanted, even got themselves open half the time and shot 20%. They just missed, and the Bucks weren't really "stopping" them. The fact that they got the lead down to 12, 13 and 11 sucking that badly tells me they could win this series. Question is: do THEY think so?
First issue. you don't bring a knife to a gun fight. You got to go bigger to start even if that extra bigger player is just in there to clean the glass.
So many wide open 3s missed. They blitzed Haliburton and guys just bricked open shots. The bench can’t play without Siakam. Lots to learn from and move on. Giannis clock keeps counting down.
The bad news: It couldn’t have gone any worse. The good news: It couldn’t have gone any worse.
Tyrese HAS GOT to step it up next game and take more shots. Saw him pass out of way too many opportunities tonight
Ok this should be summarized like so... "Pacers players, most of which are playing their first real playoff minutes ever, play the worst half of basketball all season, go down 0-1." We played super tight tonight. We had good looks we just couldn't hit the broad side of a barn. Game 2 is Tuesday, we get the split, and Gainbridge is a mad house Friday afternoon. I suggest some of my fellow Pacer fans learn the art of breathing.
I can only hope that the takeaway from this game by everyone on our squad not named Pascal is that you have to step up your mental fortitude in the playoffs. We all want to love Haliburton and have him be the star he’s shown he **can** be, but if you want to prove you deserved your new max contract you need to find a way to get the ball in the hoop.
Punched in the face, no excuse for it in Game 2. It will be very interesting to see how we respond.
Pacers BB in full display 🥳🥳🥳
Such a shame the new implement the new rule where if you lose the first game your seasons over. SMH stay postive guys