The Pacers need more than average shooting from Wesley Matthews

Wesley Matthews can’t replace Victor Oladipo, but the Indiana Pacers need more than average from him in Game 3 against the Boston Celtics.

Outside of that one pass, Wesley Matthews is playing well enough for the Indiana Pacers. At least in the sense that it 3-point shooting is at the bare minimum of not being a problem. At 33.3% from beyond the arc, Matthews is at least not wasting his shots. However, that’s only saying that he is playing offensively right at the threshold of playability.

The Pacers signed Wesley after Victor Oladipo messed up his knee, but he never was expected to fully replace Indiana’s star. He was expected to score and open of the floor a bit for the Pacers with his 3-point shooting. Since coming to the Pacers, nearly 62% of his attempts come from long-range and in the regular season, he made 37% of those attempts.

But so far in their series with the Celtics, the Pacers haven’t gotten enough from Matthews as a two-game deficit indicates.

Of course, Boston played a role in that. They’ve kept Matthews out fo the corners and out from the area above the break where he often finds success. Limiting him to 33.3%, the point where making that many 3-pointers is as valuable as someone shooting 50% on 2-pointers, is what the Celtics want.

His 7 points a game so far in the playoffs is down from his 10.9 mark in the regular season. While percentage-wise he is taking more catch-and-shoot 3-pointers, many of them are rushed as the Boston defense. They’ve either kept Matthews on the move or made him uncomfortable when he sets up to shoot.

Shooting less might not be the right answer for Matthews, but Indiana could stand to create higher quality opportunities for him. Whether that comes off screens or simply forcing the Celtics to respect them driving to the basket — and then kicking to Matthews — it isn’t as if it is all on him.

That said, he can’t force up shots like the one he did late in Game 2. Even if the clock was running down, banking one off the side of the glass isn’t helping anyone. He did have a pair of clutch 3-pointers before that, but that final attempt was far from ideal.

The bigger problem for the Pacers

Like most of Indiana’s offensive issues in the series, the genesis of the crisis springs from not having a consistent high-quality playmaker without Victor Oladipo. Matthews is more of a shooter than anything else, Bojan can score for himself but doesn’t serve as a distributor.

It doesn’t help that Myles Turner is hesitant to shoot and the Celtics are making Domantas Sabonis a non-factor, but all of the issues for an avalanche of bad when they come together all at once. If you need an example, look at the third quarter from Game 1 or the fourth from Game 3.

Wesley Matthews can only do so much to ensure better shooting chances for himself, but he can’t waste the precious few he gets, either.