How the Pacers Beat Toronto: Hitting 3s, Limiting Free Throws
By Jared Wade
The Toronto Raptors defense was above average this season. It wasn’t devastating, but solid across the board, particularly in terms of not fouling and cleaning the glass after forcing a miss.
The one area in which the Raptors struggle mightily, however, is defending the arc. Opponents hit a blistering 37.3% of their 3s against Toronto this season, second-worst in the league behind the Phoenix Suns (37.7%) and way over the league-average accuracy of 35.4%.
Essentially, everyone who shot 3s against the Raptors was as proficient as Damian Lillard (who shot 37.5% from 3-point range this year). Or you could say they became, oddly enough, Paul George, who finished sixth in the NBA with 210 made triples while shooting 37.1%.
The Pacers were not a great 3-point shooting team this season. They hit an almost-exactly-league-average 35.1% from downtown. But George Hill was deadly (40.6%) and Paul George finished sixth in the NBA with 210 made triples (at a good, 37.2% clip).
C.J. Miles was streaky as ever, and fell into a prolonged, inexplicable slump at one point, but still finished the year at 36.7% from deep. He also is currently on fire, hitting 35 of this last 76 attempts (46.1%) to close the year. With Miles, what happened five minutes ago is more important than what happened last month, so if he can stay hot all series, the Pacers’ chances go way up.
Ty Lawson has also shot fine from deep in his shot time with Indiana, making 5-of-14 atempts (35.7%), and Solomon Hill is coming off a career-high 7 made 3s in the Pacers final game of the season.
Not Fouling
On the other side of the ball, the key is not fouling and putting the Raptors on the free-throw line. DeMar DeRozan, in particular, eats at the stripe, getting there 8.4 times per game and finishing third in the NBA overall with 653 trips to the line. He also knocks down 85.0% of his freebies, so a shooting foul on DeMar is just giving away points.
Kyle Lowry, too, gets a lot of easy points. He takes 6.4 free throws per game and, like DeRozan, makes teams pay by hitting 81.1%.
On the strength of these two players earning so many free throws, the Raptors are the second-best team in the NBA at getting to the line (in terms of FTA/FGA). Overall, they scored more than one-fifth of their points this year from the free-throw line. Add that to their good 3-point attack, and the Raptors are a “Moreyball” team in action, getting the bulk of their points from the line, behind the arc, and at the rim while eschewing the lower-percentage midrange area.
Fortunately, this is what Fran Vogel is an expert at changing.
His teams have always forced the opposing offense into more mid-range jumpers than they want to take while defending the 3-point arc. The Pacers were third in the NBA this year by holding opponents to just 33.4% shooting from 3-point range. The Raptors, meanwhile hit 37.0% of their 3s on offense, good for fifth-best in the NBA.
Something’s got to give there.
Will the Pacers hit their 3s and keep the Raptors from hurting them at the line(s, both FT and 3-point)?
We will see. Everyone likes talking about how a playoff series will hinge upon star power and who wins which player matchups. But this one is likely to be decided by these factors.
If the Pacers can adopt the right game plan to slow the Raptors from getting points off free-throws and 3s while also shooting well behind the arc themselves, then they can definitely win this series.
If not? Well, they will at least get a few more stamps on their passport.