The George Hill Effect: How He Has Ignited the Pacers Offense

Getting George Hill Healthy

The Indiana Pacers announced George Hill was injured late in the preseason. It came as a sudden announcement and it seemed like a team being cautious with a guy who was a bit banged up after a long preseason.

Then they announced he would be out for three weeks — at least.

It was later revealed that he had ruptured his quad and all the mystery about “why is Hill missing so many games to start the year?” was resolved. This wasn’t some coy, early-season tanking move by the Pacers. George Hill was badly injured and would be out for awhile.

It was almost Christmas before he came back. He had missed the first 28 games, and the offense was ugly without him.

His return lasted five games.

He re-injured himself on New Year’s Eve against the Miami Heat, and would miss another 11 games. When he did return — again — he was on a strict minutes restriction and couldn’t play more than 20 minutes per game. Frank Vogel brought him off the bench so as to disrupt the first unit less while Hill got his conditioning back and readjusted after missing nearly half a season.

His last game off the bench was January 31.

Team doctors then lifted his minutes restriction and George Hill was — finally — in the starting lineup to stay. That was 11 games ago. And everything about the Indiana Pacers offense has been different since then.

George Hill Attacking

Ever since George Hill re-entered the starting lineup, the team’s ball movement has been so much better. The Indiana Pacers now have an array of proven professionals manning the perimeter, and more than any of Hill, C.J. Miles, or Rodney Stuckey being tremendous talents on their own, they all know their role and are playing it ideally.

George Hill has become aggressive with the ball in ways we rarely saw last season. He is using, early and often, his ability to attack the rim or drive-and-kick. It has opened up lanes and shots both for himself and others.

Look at the clips in this video to see how Hill has taken to attacking the hoop.

Note how many of these buckets come early in the shot clock. Increasingly, Hill is starting to think that the best option on any play is for him to immediately seek and destroy any vulnerability he sees in the defense. Last year, he was more of a caretaker point guard who brought the ball up, passed away, and moved to stand on the weak side — perhaps for the whole possession.

This year he knows that him attacking might be the best option the team has on any possession.

But this doesn’t mean he is being selfish. It’s the very opposite actually.

It is in the team’s best interest for him to attack, especially since his decision making has been so on point. If the lane closes up, he simply makes the right pass, knowing his teammates will now be able to threaten a rotating defense in the new holes that have opened up.

George Hill’s Return and the Resulting Assist Boom

This attacking and dishing is a big part of what has led to the Indiana Pacers having such a high asssist rate since George Hill returned.

His assist rate this season is 31.4%. That is a great figure for anyone — only 11 qualified guys in the NBA have an assist rate over 35% this year. We’re mostly talking about names like Russell Westbrook, Chris Paul, John Wall, LeBron James, Steph Curry, and James Harden.

So 31.4% is an excellent number for anyone. But for Hill, it is an insane figure. His best season ever was 23.4% (in his second year in Indiana), and his assist rate was just 17.4% last year.

By another measure — assists per 36 minutes — he is also destroying his career resume. Hill is averaging 6.3 assists per 36 this year, way above his 4.1 per 36 career average and blowing away the 3.9 per 36 he had last year.

It isn’t just the assists. His ability to move into space with the ball and draw help is bordering on scary this year. He isn’t exactly Chris Paul, but he is subtly seeing the future before the play fully develops. He is often taking one extra dribble to ensure the defense has to rotate that much further then laying the ball off to a teammate, who is now able to use that extra space and half second of time to score.

Or — better yet — make an extra pass.

The spacing that all this is creating opens up so much room on the court for others to work. Each few inches he creates with subtle body movements or an extra half dribble is opening up extra feet on the weak side. Yes, Rodney Stuckey and Solomon Hill are having hot shooting streaks from long range, and this might not continue. But part of the reason is because they so often have more time and space to set themselves before they launch a jumper.

And now that this is happening with regularity, those players have become comfortable. They are not rushing anymore, the game is slowing down, and the whole offensive area is less crowded.

Compared to last year — when the offense was so much more stagnant and cramped — it has been a joy to watch. And Hill’s play with the ball is doing so much more than helping his own scoring and assist numbers. There is just more space everywhere due to his probing.

Everybody is benefitting.

David West, C.J Miles, Rodney Stuckey, and Solomon Hill are all shooting way better since February. And West, Solo, and Stuckey have seen their percentage of shots that are assisted go up.

Before, West and Stuckey were the yeoman of the team who had to do stuff on their own as the plays broke down. They had to grind out buckets. Now, they are more often receiving passes that lead directly to hoops, with West’s percentage of assisted field goals rising from 72.7% to 75.9% and Stuckey’s skyrocketing from a measly 42.3% all the way to 55.2%.

George Hill Assist Rate /

The Two Greatest Possessions

The Indiana Pacers offense is now pretty.

Wait. What?

Yes, the Indiana Pacers — the professional NBA basketball team that plays in Indianapolis, Indiana — has a pretty offense now. This is a team that got to back-to-back Eastern Conference finals by smacking people in the mouth on defense and then hoping the ball happened to fall into their own basket a few times.

And, sure, this new fluid offense may not last. It could be a shooting star.

But for now, it is is here and it is eye-pleasing.

This isn’t all because of George Hill. The unselfishness around the perimeter and ball movement is simply opening up more shots all around. But Hill is the head of the spear. Between his uncanny mind-melding with David West and his newfound (or re-found) ability to drive-and-attack or drive-and-kick, good things are happening constantly all over the court.

Never have they looked better than on these two possessions.

The first, wouldn’t you know it, starts and ends with George Hill probing into the center of the defense.

He starts the play by attacking a pick-and-roll to the left. He goes further than he needs to and you can tell that he knew early on that he wasn’t going all the way to the cup. Instead, he probes one extra dribble, turn and fires to his partner in crime David West.

West wastes no time — something he has done well all year — and feeds Roy Hibbert in the post. Hibbert doesn’t make good on his first attempt at a move, but instead of holding, holding, holding the ball as he so often does, he looks to to quickly pass it out once he realizes he has no advantage. This is a good example of how the Pacers’ ball movement is becoming contagious. He passes back to West, who again holds the ball for all of a quarter second before swinging it. Miles attacks but is stifled and swings it to Hill.

Hill, as he does now instinctually, attacks.

The defense closes off his path and he, again, finds West. The shot clock is under 5 now, but West isn’t going to force the shot. He waits as the Cleveland defense utterly collapses, leaving Hill alone underneath the hoop. And West gives it back to his lil’ buddy for a layup.

Seriously, how many Pacers possessions over the past four years would it take three full paragraphs to explain? This is more ball movement — SEVEN passes in TEN seconds — than we saw sometimes in four Indiana possessions last season.

And, again, it all started — and ended — with George Hill attacking and then making the right pass when the defense cut him off.

Now watch this equally beautiful play.

I won’t go into as much detail here.

The Pacers wait a bit longer to get going in this key possession that helped them take down the Golden State Warriors in what was arguably the biggest win of their season.

But, for the record: Four passes in five seconds this time. And, yet again, the key to opening everything up is George Hill driving baseline, drawing the defense, and then finding his tag-team partner David West. And West again wastes less than half a second finding the more-open man.

The Indiana Pacers offense. It’s now a thing of beauty apparently.

Mostly because of the the George Hill effect.

Next: The George Hill/David West Pick and Roll Is Back

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