Indiana, it is.
The dreams of a Boston - New York Eastern Conference Finals came to a crashing halt on Sunday afternoon as the Pacers went into Madison Square and stunned the injury-ravaged Knicks with a 130-109 blowout win behind an NBA postseason record 67.1% shooting performance.
The sixth-seeded Pacers are the lowest seed remaining in the playoffs and will now see the top-seeded Celtics every other day, beginning with Game 1 on Tuesday at 8 p.m. ET at TD Garden.
Due to the In-Season Tournament, the two met five times this season, with Boston taking the season series three games to two.
The first loss came in December, which eliminated the Celtics from the In-Season Tournament, a game featuring 16 lead changes and 15 ties. With less than two minutes left in the fourth quarter, the score was tied at 105-105 before Indiana erupted for 17 points in the final 1:57, including a 9-0 run in under a minute, jumpstarted by a nasty four-point play by Tyrese Haliburton, who finished the night with his first career triple-double, registering 26 points, a game-high 13 assists, and 10 rebounds.
The other, Boston collapsed in the third quarter, surrendering 44 points despite Haliburton leaving the game with an injury in the first half. In total, the Celtics gave up 74 points to the Haliburton-less Pacers offense in the second half, which proved insurmountable.
“They’re a team that’s set the pace for the entire league this year, and we have an idea of what we’re getting into up there with their crowd and the level of talent they have,” said head coach Rick Carlisle of the Celtics after advancing to the Conference Final. “But this is a challenge that we’ve earned, and we’re looking forward to it.”
Amid discussions of the Celtics’ seemingly “easy” path to the Eastern Conference Finals, similar attention can be drawn to Indiana’s journey. The Pacers slipped by the Milwaukee Bucks without Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard, and the Knicks, who grappled with absences from key players including Julius Randle, Bojan Bogdanovic, Mitchell Robinson, and OG Anunoby. At the same time, Jalen Brunson and Josh Hart also played through injuries.
Here are five initial thoughts on the Celtics-Pacers Eastern Conference Finals:
Defense will be tested
From day one, the Celtics have prided themselves on the defensive end.
“Defense is what gets you in the door. Defense is the admission ticket,” Joe Mazzulla said back in October. “You just have to do it. You don’t really have a choice.”
Their commitment to this philosophy was evident in their regular-season performance. The Celtics boasted a 110.6 defensive rating, ranking them second in the NBA. This defensive mindset has carried over into the playoffs, where they are allowing a mere 96.7 points per game.
Impressively, they’ve managed to keep their opponents under 100 points in seven of their ten playoff games. Conversely, in the two games where Boston allowed 110 points or more, they lost.
However, the Pacers are a different animal compared to what the Celtics have seen.
Indy averaged an NBA-best 123.3 points per game in the regular season, on a blistering 50.7% from the field – the best mark in the NBA over the last two decades. In their five matchups against Boston, the Pacers averaged 116.8 points per game, surpassing the 120-point mark in three of those contests. For perspective, the Celtics allowed an average of only 109.2 points per game this season.
This postseason, the Pacers are averaging 114.2 points per game and hold the league’s top offensive rating at 121.7.
One area to monitor will be Boston’s transition defense – which has been a problem at times. Indiana leads the league in transition points per game this postseason (24.7) and was fourth in the regular season at 26.2.
The Celtics know the importance of getting it done on the defensive end. It’s where games are won and lost (as evidenced by the Timberwolves/Nuggets Game 7) and catalyzes Boston’s offense. Slowing down this high-octane Pacers offense will be crucial for Boston, especially considering Indiana’s defensive vulnerabilities, which leads us to our next point.
Shouldn’t see much resistance offensively
There is not much good to say about Indiana’s defense, so we’ll start by highlighting one thing they do well: keeping opponents off the three-point line.
The Pacers allowed the fewest made threes in the league this season, with opponents making just 877 (10.7 per game). They were the only team to allow fewer than 900 made triples. This number has slightly increased in the postseason, with opponents averaging 11.6 made threes per game.
Other than that, there is not much there.
Opponents averaged 120.2 points per game against the Pacers this season (fourth-most in the league) on 49.6% shooting — the highest mark in the league. This postseason, opponents are averaging 110.8 points per game on 46.7% shooting.
That type of defensive production, or lack thereof, does not bode well against a Celtics team that posted an NBA-best 122.2 offensive rating this season. To bring it down to the finer details, Boston’s 1.23 points per possession gives them the most efficient offense in the history of the NBA.
In their five matchups with the Pacers, Boston’s offense posted an offensive rating of 126,0, averaging a whopping 129.0 points per game on 52.3% shooting from the field and 43.6% from deep. Boston scored at least 112 points in five of those matchups, headlined by a 155-point night in November, which marked the second-highest total in franchise history.
Boston's stars have had their way against the Pacers. In four games against the Pacers this season, Jayson Tatum averaged 32.5 points on 57.8% shooting from the field and 48.6% from deep. Jaylen Brown averaged 28.4 points in five games on a ridiculous 60.6% shooting.
If Boston continues to defend at a high level, it will fuel their offense, leaving Indy with little chance. Success must start on the defensive end for the Celtics, allowing their offense to flow naturally against Indiana’s porous defense.
Slowing down Tyrese Haliburton
The key to slowing down Indiana’s offense is limiting Haliburton.
In 69 games this season, the 24-year-old rising star averaged 20.1 points, 10.9 assists, 3.9 boards, and 1.2 steals. However, he has not been himself since returning from a hamstring injury in January.
In his 33 games prior to the injury, the Iowa State product averaged 23.6 points per game on 49.7% shooting from the field and 40.3% from deep, with 12.5 assists, 4.2 boards, and 1.1 steals. In his 36 games after the injury, production dropped significantly, posting 16.9 points per game on 45.4% shooting from the field and 32.3% from distance, with 9.5 assists, 3.7 boards, and 1.3 steals.
Adding two-time All-NBA wing Pascal Siakam, acquired in a trade with the Raptors in mid-January, has helped mask some of Haliburton’s struggles. Siakam averaged 21.3 points on 54.9% shooting, 7.8 rebounds — both team highs — and 3.7 assists in the regular season.
If the Pacers are going to pull off the upset, they will need all hands on deck, starting with their cornerstone in Haliburton. However, Boston is no easy task for Haliburton, as the Celtics are loaded with elite defenders to challenge him, headlined by Derrick White and Jrue Holiday.
Jaylen Brown could also be an option. In limited minutes against Haliburton this season, Brown held him to 2-of-6 (33.3%) shooting with two turnovers.
The impending return of Kristaps Porzingis
It’s been three weeks since Kristaps Porzingis suffered a soleus strain in Boston’s Game 4 win over the Miami Heat in the opening round.
While Porzingis has been ramping up his rehab — participating in light but extensive offensive and defensive drills with assistant coaches Jermaine Bucknor, DJ Macleay, and Tyler Lashbrook before Game 4 in Cleveland, and completing an intense workout on the exercise bike at the Auerbach Center on Sunday — he is expected to remain sidelined for Games 1 and 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals.
Barring any setbacks, it would be surprising not to see Porzingis in this series. NBA players are creatures of habit, and one of the toughest challenges when returning from injury is finding your rhythm — especially if your first game back is in the NBA Finals. Boston should absolutely play it safe with their seven-footer, but the need for him to reacclimate to postseason play will likely factor into the decision.
Play your game
There’s a reason the Celtics are overwhelming -1400 favorites to win this series — a number only surpassed by Michael Jordan’s 1997 Bulls for a Conference Finals series price in the last 35 seasons.
The Celtics are clearly the better team. However, that doesn’t mean they can overlook the Pacers and skip steps.
Joe Mazzulla’s consistent message to stay the course and avoid preconceived expectations has resulted in the Celtics’ dominant run, and they can’t get away from that now.
Boston needs to continue to control what it can control – the margins, effort, intensity, and focus.
“What it takes to win a playoff game is what it takes to win a regular season game,” Mazzulla said prior to the playoffs. “You’re not going to have an expectation as to how it’s going to go. That’s the most important thing – very similar to the regular season. We’ve done pretty much every adjustment possible. In the playoffs, obviously, the timing of that adjustment is a little bit different depending on the series and where you are at. But it comes down to the same thing. Can you do the most important details at the highest level of stress and physicality?”
The Celtics have excelled in this regard so far this postseason, evident in their remarkable 12.8 net rating — the highest since the 2016-17 Warriors, surpassing their historic 11.6 rating from the regular season, which ranked fourth all-time in NBA history, trailing only the 1995-96 (13.4) and 1996-97 (12.0) Chicago Bulls and the 2016 (11.6) Golden State Warriors.
It was on this very stage last season that the Celtics learned the criticality of those margins. An inferior Miami Heat team capitalized on compiled mistakes, gained extra possessions through turnovers or offensive rebounds, and exploited chronic lapses in focus, ultimately ending the Celtics’ season.
If the Celtics are going to get back to the NBA Finals, it hinges upon two things: showing up on the defensive end and relying on their mental toughness and focus, two of the driving factors behind their success so far this season.
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