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Pacers Home Stand Will Propel Them to the 8th Seed

By Jared Wade

Feb 8, 2015; Charlotte, NC, USA; The Indiana Pacers take to the floor before the game against the Charlotte Hornets at Time Warner Cable Arena. Mandatory Credit: Sam Sharpe-USA TODAY Sports
Feb 8, 2015; Charlotte, NC, USA; The Indiana Pacers take to the floor before the game against the Charlotte Hornets at Time Warner Cable Arena. Mandatory Credit: Sam Sharpe-USA TODAY Sports /
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The Indiana Pacers currently sit 10th in the Eastern Conference, just two games back in the loss column from the Brooklyn Nets and Charlotte Hornets, which are tied for the 8th and final playoff spot.

There is very little separation between the 7th- and 12th-place teams, so all six of these “contenders” will likely flip around and leapfrog one another from now until the end of the season.

Indiana Pacers 10th
Indiana Pacers 10th /

I believe that when the music stops, the Indiana Pacers will be in the top seven.

The team’s return to health is the number-one reason. The potential bump — on-court and in morale — from Paul George’s probable return is another.

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But perhaps the best reason is the schedule.

Of Indiana’s remaining 25 games, are at home — including eight of their next nine games. And the one away game in this stretch will be a fun vacation to New York where they get the pleasure of stomping the Knicks in the World’s Most Famous Arena

In summation: The team has finally gotten healthy, they are scoring as good as almost anyone so far in February, and they have the defensive foundation to win any game on the strength of that alone. And now they have the cushiest part of their schedule that they have arguably had all season.

  • vs Cleveland
  • vs 76ers
  • vs New York
  • vs Chicago
  • @ New York
  • vs Orlando
  • vs Milwaukee
  • vs Boston
  • vs Toronto

If you saw what LeBron James did last night to the best-in-association Golden State Warriors, then you probably expect the Pacers to lose tonight to the Cavaliers. It will help that the Cavs are coming off their best win of the season on the second night of a back-to-back, but … yeah … Indiana is the underdog.

But after that?

Is there any reason they shouldn’t go 5-2 or better against the Knicks, Bulls, Knicks, Magic, Bucks, Celtics, and Raptors?

If they were in the Western Conference, going 5-2 is just treading water. But at the bottom of the East playoff race, that can easily take you from 10th to 7th.

The Heat will be without Chris Bosh for the rest of the season, the Nets are on a brutal Western Conference road trip, and the Pistons play seven of their next eight away from home (against the likes of Washington, Golden State, and Portland). The Hornets have a favorable schedule stretch upcoming, but they’ve lost five of their past six, so who knows whether they can be expected to go .500 against any run of opponents.

By March 17, the Pacers may well be 28-37 or better with 17 games left. Anything can happen but I don’t see any of these other teams — except Miami — getting to 28 wins by then.

And if that happens, Indiana might be sitting in 8th place just as Paul George comes back. That’s not the worst place to be. It is surprising that we got to this point so soon, but it now seems more likely than not that Indiana will get themselves into the top eight by mid-March and control their destiny for the rest of the regular season.

This is mostly due to the surprising recent success in wins over Cleveland and Golden State. Without those two Ws, they would still be facing an uphill challenge to get back into the race for the 8th seed. But they gave themselves a huge leg up by beating a few huge teams.

They’ve already done the hardest work.

Now, they just need to take care of the teams they should beat in the friendly confines of the Fieldhouse.

One last schedule note: The Pacers have five back-to-backs remaining on the schedule.

March 6 – vs Chicago
March 7 – @Knicks

March 20 – @Cleveland
March 21 – vs Brooklyn

March 25 – @Washington
March 26 – @Milwaukee

March 31 – @Brooklyn
April 1 – @Boston

April 14 – vs Washington
April 15 – @Memphis

Three of the opponents in the second games are bad Eastern Conference teams (Knicks, Brooklyn, Boston). One of the others is Milwaukee, which just made some major moves and might not be that good anymore.

The final one is the Memphis Grizzlies, which the Pacers have to play in their final game of the year the night after facing the Wizards.

It’s always possible that those final two games might be meaningless to both the Wizards and the Grizzlies. But, man, the Pacers better not hope that they need that last win in Memphis if the Grizzlies need it, too.

Next: Paul George Practices in Full, Getting Ready for Return

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