Living In the Past, Present, and Future of the Pacers

Solomon Hill lit up Bankers Life Fieldhouse on Saturday night with 28 points against the Washington Wizards and made Larry Bird look like a smart decision maker once again. Yes, it is only one game (and it was a loss), but he’s still a strong performance against a playoff quality opponent. Solomon Hill has averaged 12 points a game this season, shooting 47.6% from the field and 37.1% from beyond arc and looking like a competent player in his second year. He looks like might be able to earn himself in the Pacers rotation even when the roster gets back to full strength. In fact, people were getting excited enough last night to throw reactions like this out.

Lance Stephenson is no longer a part of the Pacers, but you wouldn’t know that from how many times his name is mentioned when people talk about Indiana this year. I don’t know how many times I wrote “without Paul George” or “without Lance Stephenson”. Last year was fun for a while, then The Struggle happened.  The emotional highs and lows of the past few seasons in Indiana were fun, but that’s just part of history now. Lance is gone. It seems as if most of the commentary on the Pacers this season is stuck in the past. Roy Hibbert is tried of hearing about it. The same goes for David West as the future of the Indiana Pacers is all they can try to control. Paul Flannery of SB Nation spoke with the Pacers about how different the team’s was a year ago and Hibbert and West don’t want to keep going back there.

"“I’m very tired of people talking about, ‘Without Lance,’” Hibbert said. “He was a great piece, but he’s not with us anymore. I miss him to death but that’s how the NBA is. OKC’s not saying we lost (James) Harden. Things happen and you’ve got to move on. I do miss Lance, he was a big part of our team but he had to do what was best for him and his family.”His light workout over, West took a seat courtside waiting for a trainer to wrap a large chunk of ice around his ankle. Even out of the lineup, he remains the team’s conscience.“Obviously it’s not what we envisioned but we’re going to work with it,” West said in his familiar raspy baritone. “We’re going to make the best of it and understand that this is the NBA. We’ve got to be professional, we’ve got to handle it and look to get the job done when we can.”"

Lance isn’t walking through that door, so the players are moving on. That’s what Pacers fans need to do too. The past isn’t going to change, and the present is what it is. This year’s injuries are just part of the reality the Pacers face. George Hill, Rodney Stuckey, or anyone else isn’t magically going to heal over night. What’s left of the Pacers roster just has to go out there and try to win games. The difficulty level is high with the roster so short, but all Indiana can do is keep fighting. Indiana will be short-handed for a while longer, but that does give Indiana a chance to look to the future and how Solomon Hill and others fit into the future. Solo’s performance against the Wizards is one of the lone bright spots in the season so far, so let’s celebrate it. If the Pacers want to be a title contender next year, his growth will be important as the Pacers have little room to make roster moves. As far as we know now, Solomon Hill is part of the future in Indiana, and it is time to focus on that.

The Games

Indiana played the Bucks at home on Tuesday night and looked awful in the loss. The turnover problems continued for Indiana with every starter committing at least two and the team shot below 40 percent on the night. When you combine that with only three players scoring in double-digits, Indiana can’t expect to win.

The Pacers headed to Washington the next night for one of two games against the Wizards last week, and it was the beginning of the current stretch of three games where the Pacers play well, but it just isn’t enough. Indiana pushed the Wizards to overtime thanks to 31 points by Donald Sloan, but came up short in the 96-94 loss. Hibbert didn’t have his best night offensively, but he’d bounce back in a big way on Friday.

Indiana headed to Boston and Roy carried the Pacers offense with 22 points, while swatting four shots by the Celtics. The Pacers started to turn the corner on turnovers as well, but came up short in the 101-98 loss.

The Pacers ended the week back at home for a rematch with the Washington Wizards but things started off poorly when Hibbert came out of the game with an injury to his left knee. At that point, Indiana officially didn’t have a any of last year’s regular starters available. But it wasn’t game over as Solomon Hill took over as the number one option for the Pacers and scored 28 points to lead a Pacers’ comeback. But without enough talent or depth, Indiana watched Washington pull away, handing the Pacers their sixth straight loss, 97-90.

Why six straight losses? Let’s go down the list of injuries: Paul George (leg), David West (ankle), George Hill (knee), C.J. Watson (foot), Rodney Stuckey (ankle), C.J. Miles (migraines) and then Roy Hibbert is now day-to-day (knee). That is a good seven-man rotation, but with that many players gone Indiana had to apply for the hardship exception to sign A.J. Price as the 16th player on the roster. It is hard to win missing that much talent and Frank Vogel doesn’t even have a lot of flexibility with the current roster either.

Worth a read: 8p9s Roundtable: Early Season Thoughts

Worth a listen: Miller Time Podcast #83: Sure, Why Not?

Ebay Finds of the Week: It is going to be a cold, hard winter for Indiana Pacers fans. Better get ready now.