Why the Pacers path to basketball salvation may lie with their defense, not their offense
The contest and contrast between the Pacers random offense and OKC’s smothering defense was framed as the marquee battle that would define the 2025 NBA Finals. Styles are supposed to make fights, but the reason this series has been a good one is not because of the Pacers offense.
In his preview with Caitlin Cooper, Zach Lowe said scoring on the Thunder’s defense is “the biggest puzzle to solve in the NBA.” Cooper called it “the toughest defensive test [the Pacers] have seen.”
Through four games, the puzzle remains unsolved; the test has answers left blank. OKC’s defense has Indiana in basketball hell.
In a very basic sense, they just aren’t scoring: Indiana put up 120 points per 100 possessions through the first three rounds of the playoffs; in the finals, that has fallen to 111. That is the equivalent of falling from top 5 level offense to the bottom 10.
But it’s more than that. The lyricism, pace, and controlled chaos that have come to define Indiana’s offensive style have been either intermittent or altogether absent. In its place is a choppy, turnover-prone, east-west version unable to pose consistent problems to Oklahoma City’s elite defenders. Indiana’s offense hasn’t just been watered down; it has lost its flavor almost entirely.
We can quantify this, combining a number of attributes that define the Pacers’ offensive style into a single number, mashing together the quick passing, paint touches, (low) turnovers, fast pace, early-clock offense, high shot quality, and elite jump shooting that Indiana is known for (details for the data used below the graphic).
Using this Frankestein’d single score, in the regular season, no team played as “Pacers-y” as the Pacers (duh!). That slipped through the first three rounds as their pace dipped and teams began to wall off the paint. And through the first four games of the finals, it has been nothing short of catastrophe.
This chart shows the sum of the z-scores for eight publicly available statistics from PBP Stats and NBA Stats: passes per 100 poss., paint touches per 100 poss., turnovers per 100 poss., % of a team’s FGA that are either wide open jumpers OR taken within 5ft of the basket, eFG%, seconds per poss., % of a team’s FGA taken in the last 8 seconds of the shot clock, and seconds per touch. This represents my view of the best publicly available statistics corresponding to Indiana’s offensive style or identity. Others, such as playtype data like pick-and-roll volume or pace off makes, are not able to be broken down by series; still more, like time across half court, are not publicly available to the best of my knowledge. I welcome feedback on this criteria, which is meant to be illustrative, not mathematically precise.
What happened? For starters, Indiana has so far failed the most fundamental, yet challenging test OKC’s defense poses to its opponents: they’ve turned it over way too often.
Per Cleaning the Glass, Indiana committed the 3rd fewest turnovers per 100 possessions during the regular season; in the Finals, they are turning it over at a rate that would rank last in the league by a mile. Their ability to generate quality shots has fallen from fourth best to 25th. And like all of the Thunder’s previous opponents, they have been unable to touch the paint.
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A high-quality shot is defined here as either one that is taken within 5ft of the basket, or that is classified as a wide open jump shot by NBA Stats and Second Spectrum.
In assessing the Pacers’ offensive struggles, Haliburton’s uncharacteristic turnovers have been particularly noteworthy. During the regular season, Haliburton committed 1.1 live ball turnovers per 75 possessions per PBP stats; in the finals, that number has more than tripled to 3.8. He has committed more live ball turnovers (15) in the last four games than in any previous four-game period of his career. From the All-Star break through the end of the regular season, a period in which he played 21 games, Haliburton committed two fewer live ball turnovers (13) than he did in these four most meaningful games of his career.
Given the degree of Indiana’s offensive struggles, it is almost unbelievable that the series is tied at two games apiece. But as Caitlin Cooper noted in February, very often with this team, success on one end of the floor begets success at the other. It’s just that in this series, it has been success on defense leading to success on offense, rather than Indiana’s more typical pattern of scores leading to stops.
The Pacers offense has been exceptional in its haphazardness, but their defense, and particularly Andrew Nembhard’s pressure against the MVP, has been exceptional in its force and intensity.
No one has pressured Shai like Nembhard has done through these first four games of the finals. No quarter of Pacers play this season saw them rack up more stocks (steals + blocks) than they did in the fourth quarter of game 3 against the Thunder. The Pacers are limiting OKC to 14.3 wide open three point attempts per game, the fewest any team allowed the Thunder all season. And while OKC’s defense is holding Indiana 5.4 points per 100 below their regular season scoring average, Indiana has forced the Thunder 7 points per 100 below theirs – defying type as they attempt to defy the odds.
In a season and a playoff run defined by the Pacers’ ability to do the impossible, it is fitting that their likeliest path to basketball salvation should lie at the end of the court where they must stare down their greatest demons and, once again, prove everyone wrong.
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