How much blame does Nate McMillan deserve for the Pacers Game 1 performance?

How much of the Pacers Game 1 dud falls on the shoulders of Nate McMillan?

In their most important game of the season thus far, Nate McMillan’s Indiana Pacers played what may be their worst half in a long time. Worse than the 24-0 run in Oklahoma City, worse than the second half against Philadelphia.

In this second half, Indiana scored eight third-quarter points and 29 in the entire half. Their 74 points are the lowest in a playoff game since the Grizzlies sputtered against the Spurs for 68 points about a half-decade ago. It was a forgettable showing from Indiana.

When catastrophe strikes, the angry mob seeks someone to blame. It’s one of the consistent phenomena of the human race throughout time and it held true today. Inevitably, one of the names that come up consistently when the Pacers play poorly is Nate McMillan. The “fire Nate” takes come and go, but they were out in full force after the bludgeoning Boston dealt Indy this afternoon.

So, how much blame does Nate McMillan deserve? Not only for the 24 minutes of misery in Boston today but for the Pacers’ shortcomings as a whole? McMillan is far from a perfect coach. He has many flaws and the Celtics today were in an ideal position to expose those flaws.

In contrast to the Golden State Warriors, third quarter collapses have become somewhat of a theme for this Pacer team late in this season. After the All-Star break, the Pacers’ third-quarter net rating of -9.1 is the fourth worst in the league. During 14 games in the month of March, that net rating plummets to -17.2, only trailing the dumpster fire that is the New York Knicks.

The “turd quarter” was in full effect today, only scoring eight in 12 minutes. Though part of this was the players missing shots they hit in the first half, McMillan deserves some blame for failing to adjust in the second half. Brad Stevens, a master of after-half tinkering, shut down Indiana’s offense. Granted, Kyrie Irving took over in the third. When he’s on, there’s nothing anyone can do:

Domantas Sabonis struggled mightily, only mustering seven points in this game. Part of this is his own limitations: his right hand is ineffectual and the Celtics have the big men to sit on his right shoulder and make his usual post wizardry near impossible to consistently execute.

However, Sabonis is too skilled for his only use to be stagnant post-ups and dribble handoffs. His passing and handling craft are waiting to be taken advantage of and McMillan hasn’t shown any willingness to do that thus far.

Myles Turner only took six shots. The Celtics set up their pick and roll coverage in a way where Turner was in a position to get a lot of good looks, but the Pacers didn’t attack that. McMillan repeatedly called reversal dribble handoffs for Bogdanovic or someone else, which the Celtics were ready for and blew up over and over.

His offense is always bad. This is nothing new, really. But in the playoffs, it would be nice to see him make some adjustments based on his opponent. One more qualm: playing TJ Leaf at all is inexcusable to me. He is not a rotation player; if Nate wants to go 10 deep, play Kyle O’Quinn or Aaron Holiday (who played well in very limited action) over Leaf. As the underdog, there’s plenty of room to get funky.

Lost in the garbage of the second half was, as usual, McMillan coached a fantastic defensive game. Boston scored an anemic 84 in their own right, bolstered by Marcus Morris hitting shots he normally doesn’t and a Terry Rozier contested buzzer beater three. Al Horford and Gordon Hayward scored 10 apiece, Jayson Tatum scored 15 and Irving only scored 20, shooting 35.3% from the field.

In the first half especially, the Pacers’ rotations were crisp and disciplined. The Pacers did an excellent job forcing Boston into tough shots and their effort was superb. Pinpointing defensive coaching is harder than offensive coaching because of the lack of sets to diagnose, but it’s easy to discern the positive impact McMillan’s coaching has on stymieing opponent offenses.

This is the conundrum: what does a team do with a 99th percentile defensive coach and 0th percentile offensive coach. The answer is unequivocally not firing him. Even if Victor Oladipo was healthy, I could imagine the offense struggling against elite defenses.

However, the Pacers aren’t winning a title with their roster in its current form. They crave another true offensive creator. The nature of great primary initiators supersedes incompetent offensive coaching. Victor Oladipo’s shot creation combined with the services of, I don’t know, a Kemba Walker and/or Nikola Mirotic would make McMillan’s offense look a lot less egregious on most nights. It is fair to argue McMillan caps the ceiling of Indiana’s offense. He isn’t getting the most out of Sabonis’ unique skill set — and Turner has more offensive potential waiting to be unlocked.

A realistic fix the Pacers can employ now is hiring an offensive coordinator type to completely take the offensive responsibilities from McMillan. Allow Nate to hone in on making the defense as staunch as it can be and find a creative mind to improve offensive flow. Firing McMillan is a gamble not worth taking. Even if you truly believe the Pacers are doomed with him at the helm, who is coming to save them? Not Ty Lue, not Monty Williams and certainly not Jason Kidd.

The Pacers are not going to win this series. Without Victor Oladipo, they never were. Outmatched against a superior opponent, it is important to glean not only the bad but the good. This is not the true Indiana Pacers. That team is the one who (hopefully) will add a piece or two this offseason and contend in the East for many years to come, under the coaching direction of Nate McMillan.