It’s official, everyone. The Indiana Pacers are playoff bound.
No need to panic, everybody. While this season has not at all gone how Indiana Pacers fans wanted, they will still be playing for a shot at the title come mid-April.
They have officially clinched a playoff birth.
The Heat loss to the Bucks last night was the game that sealed the deal. Because of that loss, the Pacers can finish this season no worse than 8th in the Eastern Conference, because there is no way the 9th seeded Magic and the 8th seeded Heat can both catch the Pacers in the standings.
While the Pacers themselves aren’t playing too well as of late, they are in the midst of their hardest stretch of the season and getting healthy simultaneously. Even without the teams best player in Victor Oladipo, this team has shown that when the rest of the squad is healthy, they can make some noise. They may even be able to upset someone in a playoff series.
At the time of clinching the playoff birth, the Indiana Pacers sit as the 4 seed in the Eastern Conference, though they are clinging to it for dear life. If they play well the rest of the season and one of the Boston Celtics or Philadelphia 76ers stumble, Indiana could see themselves climb into the 3-spot in the Eastern Conference, but it appears overwhelmingly likely that the squad will be one of the seeds in the 4-5 matchup.
Whether they have homecourt or not has yet to be determined. Heck, who their opponent will be has yet to be determined. The Celtics could catch the Sixers. Essentially, we don’t know who the Pacers will play in the first round of the playoffs yet, but I would put Boston as the most likely matchup.
The Pacers play the Celtics two more times this season. If they can win both of those games they could still have a good shot at hosting a first-round season against Boston.
That would be added gravy for the Pacers. Making the playoffs is a huge deal, and they accomplished that today. Now, it’s time for the team to do damage in the postseason.