Post-Game Grades: Pacers Lack Luster vs Raptors in Game 7 as Late Comeback Fails

The Indiana Pacers let Game 7 get away in the third quarter to such a degree that their late-game comeback was not enough.

The Good: The Indiana Pacers again showed a lot of fight. Their sins in this game were venial not cardinal. They blew several coverages in the thrid quarter that allowed the Toronto Raptors to make easy 3s and make those easy 3s they did. In a game where you get a bit better luck, a couple of those mistakes don’t haunt you — the opponent misses the shots. But it seemed like Toronto capitalized on all those errors.

The Raptors role players really showed up. Norm Powell was a godsend for a team that was looking to fight off some demons. He’s a rookie who was picked in the second round and seemed too green to know he wasn’t supposed to be hitting 3-of-4 triples in a Game 7. Cory Joseph was great, too, scoring 8 points to go with 4 assists and a lot of disruptive drives. And Patrick Patterson went 3-of-5 from behind the arc. That’s 32 combined points from guys who aren’t big focuses of the game plan. If you lose like that, while holding the opponent’s two All-Stars to 15-of-46 (32.6%) shooting, you really just got to tip your cap.

Again, the Pacers made the errors. The blown coverages were bad, leading to the aforementioned 3s. The inability to rebound — again — led to 18 offensive rebounds for the Raptors on 55 missed shots and a 17-to-3 second-chance points disadvantage. And the Pacers committed 5 turnovers in the final 4:22 of the game.

Two of those giveaways came from Paul George, who admitted he was “gassed a little bit” after a game in which he played 46 minutes and committed 7 turnovers overall. Monta Ellis also had one of the other late-game turnovers, and he played 37 minutes.

Of course, one of those turnovers should not have been a turnover at all.

As mistake-prone as the Pacers were in a third quarter where they were outscored by 8 and watched a 6-point deficit balloon to 14, Indiana still had — quite literally — a shot to win the game.

Down 3, with around 20 seconds left, Paul George drove towards the hoop. He pulled up, seemingly to take the shot. But instead he tossed a lob to Ian Mahinmi. It could have been a dunk with 14 seconds left that would have cut the deficit to 1. And given the clear contact, perhaps Ian could have dunked it and gone to the line for a freebie to tie it up.

Instead, he was shoved hard in the back as he jumped and sent flying, with no chance to even get a hand on the pass let alone finish the lob.

It was a clear, obvious, indisputable foul.

The ref called nothing though.

It was a big deal and quite a shame. There was an injustice, and Pacers fans were understandably livid because, obviously, this play essentially ended their team’s season. Toronto recovered what the play-by-play now lists as a “bad pass turnover” and were up 3 with nearly no time remaining. But also they were upset because this has happened before, twice against the Bulls in the regular season, the Pacers lost on bad calls that the NBA later admitted were incorrect.

There is, however, reality vs. emotion. The emotion is understandably running heavy right now since the team was wronged. But the reality is that it is unlikely that the Pacers would have won even if that foul was called.

Ian, a 60% free-throw shooter, would have had to make both of those free throws. And then, in the ensuing 14 seconds, the Raptors would inbound the ball to a good free-throw shooter and likely build on their 1-, or 2-, or 3-point lead. And then the notoriously-bad-late-game-offense-running Pacers would have to score again.

It may have gone down in a way where the Pacers come out on top or force overtime. Hell, Solomon Hill is the new Reggie Miller it seems, so perhaps he would have won the game with 4-point play.

But while that call was rotten, the Pacers put themselves in a big hole and had to rely on a blend of really good fourth-quarter defense and the Raptors going into an inexplicable prevent offense to even crawl back as far as they did. Credit them — big-time — for that. They tightened the vice and showed why such a flawed roster was still able to have the third-best defense in the NBA this season. They held the Raptors, a team that largely looked like it only wanted to run out the clock in the final five minutes, to just 11 points in the fourth quarter. That’s remarkable even if the Raptors were playing “prevent” offense.

So the comeback effort was commendable and the no-call on Mahinmi was trash. It could have swung the game, the series, and — without exaggerating — Raptors’ franchise history.

Really, though, the Pacers lost this game in the third quarter on small, but vital, mistakes that you cannot make in a Game 7 and expect to win. And in a more forgivable sense, they lost this game because Toronto’s role players stepped up whereas those of the Pacers, with the notable exception of Rodney Stuckey (and Solo to a much lesser degree momentarily with a dunk), did not produce. Myles Turner was awful, and Norm Powell was a beast.

The age-old adage in the NBA is that stars travel but role players do not. This means that role players do well at home but can’t be trusted on the road. That’s exactly what happened here. The Pacers best three veterans did really well, and their other guys did not. And this problem was compounded by the three veterans having to play massive minutes and, it can be reasoned, committing some fatigue-based mistakes down the stretch (and earlier in the third).

So the Pacers simply were not deep enough or able to focus enough for 48 minutes to beat a 2-seed that won 56 games this year. They didn’t do the little things you need to be a top-tier team in this league nor did they have the “x-factor” performance from anyone who unexpectedly produced off the bench.

That is not surprising.

But like the foul no-call on Mahinmi, it probably does sting fans emotionally. Because the Pacers were right there. It doesn’t feel like a series in which the Pacers were simply beaten by a better squad. They really should have won Game 5, and they really should have completed this upset. And they should have gotten that call in Game 7 and had one last chance.

None of that happened, however.

So the team will have to live with this being a season in which it overachieved by some measures but also underachieved by not advancing to the second round.

The Bad: Drake’s jean jacket.

MVP: Paul. George. Indiana’s superstar not only just played his first playoff series since his two broken bones healed, but I am convinced he played his first playoff series since he had adamantium fused to his entire skeleton to aid in the recovery process. I personally have not read the bylaws and don’t know the NBA’s policy on that. But it seems illegal. Real-life Wolverines shouldn’t be allowed in the NBA. I will not back down from my stance on that, and I don’t care who says otherwise. It isn’t fair. It’s just wrong. Dwane Casey has a right to log a complaint to the league office.

LVP: Drake’s trash new album. At least the last one was 50% listen-to-able during the Future parts.

X-Factor: Rodney Stucky. Dude got buckets. (It’s Norm Powell really.)

Paul George put the Pacers on his back at some point in all seven of these games and was just a basketball virtuoso. He led, he scored, he defended, he did the remarkable, he shined.

Paul George is all the way back.

And now he is angry. I fear for the perimeter players on various international teams that will have to face him this Summer in Rio.

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I need to do some more research before committing to this. And obviously it is relatively meaningless in a loss. But my first instinct is to call this the most impressive playoff series of both his career and any NBA Pacer ever. He was remarkable on both sides of the ball, keeping an All-Star looking like a hobo while posting a league-high postseason PER and points-per-game average.

Paul George put the Pacers on his back at some point in all seven of these games and was just a basketball virtuoso. He led, he scored, he defended, he did the remarkable, he shined.

Paul George is all the way back.

And now he is angry. I fear for the perimeter players on various international teams that will have to face him this Summer in Rio.