Grades: Indiana Pacers get the last yeehaw against Spurs

The Indiana Pacers got their first road win of the season in San Antonio tonight.

The Indiana Pacers won their first game away from Bankers Life Fieldhouse this season. They controlled the game from start to finish in San Antonio en route to a rout of the Spurs:

This one was never close, really. The Pacers were up 12 halfway through and looked like the better team at every turn. In the first quarter, the starters got off to a great start, jumping out to a 9-5 lead. The second unit came in and kept everything afloat, and the mixing and matching of the Pacers depth buried the Spurs.

The Pacers were on fire from the outside. They hit 17 of their 32 three-point attempts, and only one player who took a three didn’t make one (dangit, TJ Leaf). That spaced out the floor for everything else the Pacers wanted to do, and they were able to carve up the normally solid Spurs defense.

The Good: The bench was back to being the best. After struggling against the Minnesota Timberwolves, the second unit was exceptional in this one. Cory Joseph was +30 and Domantas Sabonis was a +32. The Pacers depth overwhelmed that of the Spurs, and it carried the team to victory.

Also, Sabonis threw down this bad boy:

The Bad: The Pacers couldn’t get to the free throw line. They were only able to garner eight attempts from the charity stripe in this one, and given that those shots are extremely efficient, you would hope the team could muster more than 8.

Fortunately, they made 7 of them, so this is mostly nitpicking. But it would have been nice to see the Pacers get to the line more.

MVP: Victor Oladipo, and this is an easy answer. 21 points on only 12 shots, 9 assists, and 5 rebounds. He controlled so much of the Indiana Pacers offense when he was in the game, and it made things easy for everyone else.

He also got two steals, which extends his steal streak to… one game. Time to get another one rolling.

LVP: I’m picking Bojan Bogdanovic because I have to pick someone. It’s not like Bojan was bad, he was just the least value player for the Pacers in terms of his impact on winning. He hit a three and played alright defense, and he added seven total points on only seven shot attempts. A solid night for an LVP.

X-Factor: Three point shooting. Hitting 53.1 percent from the outside will win you a lot of games, and tonight it was the difference maker. The Pacers were +33 from the outside. That is too much to overcome for most teams.

Now let’s assign some grades.

The Pacers next game is in Cleveland on Saturday. The will look to avenge their playoff loss to the Cavaliers in that one.