Four ways the Indiana Pacers can reach their ceiling this season

Indiana Pacers (Photo by Ron Hoskins/NBAE via Getty Images)

Until Victor Oladipo returns, the Indiana Pacers will need these four things to work out in their favor to reach their season-long ceiling.

The Indiana Pacers’ hopes and dreams ultimately lie in the hands of Victor Oladipo. Until Oladipo returns from injury in December or January, the rest of the Pacers will have some stuff to work through.

While Indiana’s record probably won’t be great until Oladipo returns to the floor, there will still be plenty of interesting storylines.

The four listed below are the most important in determining how well this Pacers season shapes out — both with and without Oladipo.

1. A perfect cohesion of TurBonis

Ever since acquiring Domantas Sabonis, the Pacers knew they would either have to make it work with him and Myles Turner or trade one of them for a better-fitting piece. In their two seasons together in Indiana, Sabonis has mostly backed-up Turner while sharing the floor with him very little.

In 2017-18, the duo had a minus-8.7 net rating in just about five minutes per game. Last season, the net rating improved to 2.8 in 6.7 minutes per game.

The leap in net rating is a positive sign, but TurBonis still barely shared the floor. With a reliable crutch in Thaddeus Young, it didn’t make much sense in the moment for Nate McMillan to give the young duo any serious run.

A major increase in minutes shared on the floor for Sabonis and Turner would make a ton of sense for the Pacers next season whether Young re-signed in free agency or not. With Sabonis less than a year away from restricted free agency, increasing his workload and giving him more run with the starting lineup would be a good test to determine how much he is really worth.

With Young going elsewhere and the drafting of Goga Bitadze, the Pacers pushed themselves into a corner — they now have no other option but to start Sabonis and Turner together and to play them high minutes.

The short-term prospects of Sabonis-Turner duo are debatable; both are very talented but the fit isn’t perfect. The talent may overcome the fit or vice versa.

Long-term, however, this is ideal for the Pacers. With Oladipo slated to miss a quarter or more of the season, TurBonis will run the show. They will be the team’s best two active players and responsible for how many possessions end on both ends of the floor.

The Pacers’ record during this time won’t matter much. It is expected for them to tread water while balancing the fact that their best player is out and they are incorporating four new starters. Trying to bend TurBonis as much as possible, seeing what the duo can and can’t sustain, will be necessary for Pacers brass to decide the team’s best future path.

The re-addition of Oladipo may be able to cover up any weaknesses of TurBonis and strengthen the strengths. Oladipo, as good as he is, doesn’t possess the all-encompassing ability to fill deep holes as a LeBron James or Giannis Antetokounmpo does.

For TurBonis to work, the first key will be setting the spacing. Space matters in basketball nowadays, which is why we rarely see players such as Sabonis and Turner playing together. Sabonis almost always gravitates to the rim and while Turner has seeped out towards the perimeter more often the past couple of seasons, the majority of his shots are still at the rim or in the mid-range.

Turner is very comfortable in the mid-range, attempting 45 percent of his shots there last season, per Cleaning The Glass. The extra space created from him stepping back just a few feet, however, allows Sabonis much more room to operate down low.

Turner and Sabonis both manning the paint isn’t always a bad thing. This screen from Turner allows Sabonis to get to his spot quicker and easier.

The most efficient offensive sets for the Pacers this year will involve having either of Turner and Sabonis at the top of the key while the other holds position down low. The duo has gotten particularly good with this quick action, where Sabonis will quickly seal his defender and get an on-point entry pass from Turner.

The spacing will help others as well. When passing lanes are this wide open for Sabonis, good things will happen.

With Sabonis’s gravity on pick-and-rolls, perimeter players spotting-up will have opportunities at open shots. In certain lineups, like the one below, it will be Doug McDermott. Turner could see a fair amount of these looks as well, though.

Sabonis and Turner just haven’t shared the floor enough to determine whether the duo is viable for big minutes. Now the starting frontcourt, they will have plenty of opportunities to work out the kinks before Oladipo returns and ultimately determine whether TurBonis is a winning match.

If it isn’t, the Pacers may have to cut bait with one of the two and continue to roll the roster over — hoping to eventually find the right combination. If it is, however, Indiana may have its next championship-contending core in place.