Indiana Pacers Defense: How Good Is It This Year?

The Indiana Pacers had the NBA’s best record in February, going 7-2. In the process, they put themselves in eighth place in the Eastern Conference and have set themselves up well to stay there — or climb — before the playoffs begin.

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It is definitely strange that the Pacers, a team that was in 12th place on January, ran off the league’s best record for a month. Stranger still is how they did it.

The Pacers were the best-shooting team in February, hitting 47.3% of their shots, including 40.3% of their 3-point attempts. Overall, they had the fifth-best offense in February, scoring 107.2 points per 100 possessions, according to NBA.com.

What in the world?

How could this happen?

Weird.

Nevertheless, it did and the Indiana Pacers have been an offensive juggernaut for the past 10 games. But what about the other side of the ball? Now that the Pacers are beating all comers with their 17 Seconds or More attack, are they still playing the type of defense we have become accustomed to over the past four years?

Well … yes and no.

If you could point to three things that have underpinned this run, they would be (a) Indiana’s excellent overall performance, (b) George Hill steadying the team so that it is playing better late in games, and (c) Rodney Stuckey stealing opponents’ souls when he comes off the bench.

Defense wouldn’t make the list. The team’s defense ranked 19th in the NBA in February, per NBA.com, and there haven’t been many full games where they really shut teams down. There have been quarters here and there — and they were dominant for the final 36 minutes against the short-handed Cavaliers — but this isn’t the team we saw last year on the defensive side of the ball.

For obvious reasons.

Paul George is arguably the best wing defender in the NBA, and C.J. Miles is not.

Lance Stephenson is big, strong athlete who could defend quick point guards and big small forwards. And Rodney Stuckey is not.

George Hill started 76 games last year. And George Hill has started 13 games this year.

As a result, the Indiana Pacers defense — which was the best in the league in 2012-13 and 2013-14 — has fallen to the 9th best in the NBA this season.

Indiana Pacers Defense /

There isn’t a lot of analysis that needs to be done as to why other than the personnel changes and all the injuries this season. Really, Frank Vogel deserves immense praise for still having a top-1o defense this year and it speaks to just how great of a defensive coach he is and how well he has taught the Pacers system to everyone on his roster.

But we can take a look at a few interesting numbers to see how the defense is different.

The biggest reason it has dropped off is obvious: Teams are making a higher percentage of their shots against Indiana. They are allowing an 48.1% eFG% to opponents this year, which is a huge jump from the past two years, via Basketball-Reference.

Interestingly, however, most of these extra makes are coming from the midrange, the so-called worst place for teams to shoot. Indiana is defending 3-pointers just as well as they did last season — and better in terms of defending corner 3s — and teams are shooting worse at the rim against the Indiana Pacers this year.

That last fact speaks to the strength of Roy Hibbert and Ian Mahinmi’s ability to protect the rim. Even without Paul George, Lance Stephenson, and (usually) George Hill defending the perimeter, the Pacers are harder to score against at the rim than they were in the past two seasons.

Indiana Pacers /

The Pacers are giving up more 3-pointers this season, however.

Now, the accuracy they are surrendering is the same as last year (though much worse than their unreal arc-defending performance in 2012-13). But teams are making 7.4 treys per game against Indiana this year compared to 6.6 and 5.4 in the past two years, respectively.

And they are also allowing slightly more dunks and layups per game despite the better defense in terms of FG% at the rim.

Indiana Pacers /

This is probably a result of league-wide trends.

Teams are shooting more 3s and trying to attack the rim more as opposed to shooting midrange shots. Not every team is the Houston Rockets, but more 3s are going up every season, and the Indiana Pacers defensive numbers bear that out.

Next: West and Hill Fool Cavs with a Give and Go

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How Good Is the Indiana Pacers Defense?

By Jared Wade | Mar 2, 2015

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