3 positives, 2 negatives in Pacers In-Season Tournament win vs. Cavaliers

Positive: Late-game heroics lead to Pacers win

While the Cavaliers played hard and almost stole the game from the Pacers, in the end, it wasn’t enough. This is due to two players in particular, arguably the two most beloved Pacers on the team, Tyrese Haliburton and Myles Turner.

The Cavaliers kept the game close until the end, only trailing by one as the game reached inside 30 seconds. That is until Tyrese Haliburton did what he does best and extended the Pacers’ lead to three with a beautiful stepback jumper off an iso.

While it was a bit jarring to see the shot called as a two instead of a three, the Pacers chugged along with momentum on their side, being up by three and only needing to defend for 16.5 seconds to secure the win.

Enter Myles Turner. At the end of a fantastic individual performance, Turner met a cutting Evan Mobley at the rim and denied his dunk attempt, crushing the hearts of the Cavaliers and giving them even less time to set up a shot to tie the game.

While this is certainly not the first clutch block Turner has had, it might be the most emphatic, as Mobley looked like nobody could stop him from going to the rim until he met Turner there.

With this Turner rejection and Caris LeVert’s subsequent missed three, the Pacers eeked out a win that was closer than they would have liked, but a win nonetheless.

They also got some more national attention, as in addition to the egregious court, Haliburton’s shot and Turner’s block were posted on media outlets as the Pacers were given some extra noise around the league after being the first team to win an In-Season Tournament game.

While Turner’s block was fantastic in making sure nobody on Cleveland scored, this game came down to Tyrese Haliburton, who stepped up in the clutch to snatch the game away from Cleveland in the final moments by basically doing it all.

And to think, Haliburton was looking at his worst performance in a Pacers uniform before this closing stretch.