On Sunday evening, a basketball franchise, city, and state have a chance to be altered forever.
Indiana is a state that’s always overlooked. It’s a state where no one chooses to be an underdog, they just accept the inevitability. Flyover state. Drive-through country. Whatever you want to call it. You’ll be reminded of it your entire life.
So therewithin develops a will to overcome. Not to prove others wrong, but to prove to yourself that it can be done. Something embodied by these Pacers perhaps more than any team ever could. Through every slightest success that was called a fluke and through every insurmountable lead overcome, Indiana has remained resilient.
I think back to the “Built, not bought” Pacers, developed to stand in the way of an unstoppable object. A brick wall into front of a wrecking ball. A Roy Hibbert verticality contest in front of a LeBron James bully drive. The only thing that remains is wreckage—the wreckage of a plan, the wreckage of a dream. Time lost to failure.
What does failure mean? It doesn’t mean losing. A loss is as lasting as a win. It is a moment in time, but it stays there. It does not come with you unless you choose to bring it along.
Failure is lost time. All time is lost, but not all time is worth losing. Teammates fighting. Players questioning each other. It can be miserable to remain around people you do not like. Why fight to remain in that situation?
What we’re seeing now can’t end in failure. Playing good basketball, most of the time. Enjoying your coaches. Enjoying your teammates. Playing your part in something much greater than yourself.
If the Pacers come up short this Sunday, what gets left behind? A postseason of dramatic comebacks and mind-blowing game-clinchers. A style of basketball that not only leads to wins, but also to jumping, screaming, and utter enjoyment of this beautiful game.
For Indiana, this was a postseason of performing at their highest level.
Whether it is _the_ highest level will be determined Sunday. But Oklahoma City’s highest level is not of concern for Indiana. They are playing their own game, for better or worse.
To stand tall above the rest requires a system that produces greater results. To be more refined, more committed, and more creative than your peers. It requires action, not thought.
Kevin Pritchard built the Pacers brick by brick. Hiring Rick Carlisle and quickly giving up on the Nate Bjorkgren experiment. Trading a box-score stuffing big man for an offensive engine in Tyrese Haliburton. Getting Aaron Nesmith as a flyer in the Malcolm Brogdon trade. Hitting on late-1st and 2nd round picks from the Caris LeVert deal with Andrew Nembhard and Ben Sheppard. He turned the veterans of the previous era of the Pacers into the heart and grit of the current one. And sometimes he got lucky as he tried but failed to replace Myles Turner with Deandre Ayton.
And then there’s that one last big move: acquiring Pascal Siakam, a superstar in his own right. A tremendous all-around player that leads by example. Siakam was no cherry on top. He was an extra gear. He was fuel to a fire that was just starting to burn hot.
A championship is the ultimate win in sports—a crowning achievement that will forever solidify your greatness. It is a moment that lives in the rafters forever.
But that moment, if it goes the other way, will never change what this Indiana Pacers team is. A team that doesn’t only do it right now, but has done it right for years. A team that has stuck with its process despite past shortcomings and now finds itself on the brink of permanence.
Neither success nor failure are on the line for Indiana Sunday night. But boy it’d be nice to be a king with a crown.
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