GAME 7 Locked In! Pacers Dominate OKC | 02:23
**Andrew Jackson with AFP from Fox Sports**
June 23rd, 2025 9:15 am
The buses are ready, and Rick Carlisle can’t get them out of his head.
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The Indiana Pacers coach will not be short of motivation, not that his team needs it anyway, on Monday as the Eastern Conference underdogs look to make history in Game 7 of the NBA Finals.
Indiana was widely counted after a calf injury left Tyrese Haliburton in doubt for Game 6, but instead the Pacers guard stepped up in a big way to keep the series and their championship dream alive.
With victory on Monday, the Pacers would be the biggest preseason underdog to win a title in NBA history, and if coach Carlisle was looking for another way to lean into that narrative he found it on the morning of Game 7.
Vision emerged on social media of the Thunder preparing their championship buses for the parade and the Pacers coach admitted it was “all I’m thinking about it”.
“I just saw a video that’s probably going to go viral, with open-top buses presumably for the parade, already painted with them as champions,” Carlisle said in his pre-game press conference in response to the opening question, which was on a completely different topic.
It is not like the Pacers needed another reason to think they were being counted out ahead of Game 7.
Haliburton said ahead of the championship-deciding game that the Pacers need to have their focus firmly on the Thunder and block out the “poison” of narratives popping up.
“The narratives are going to be almost poison,” Haliburton said.
“To talk about what this would mean to our city and our organisation and legacy talk, and how we played so well and now the pressure is on (the Thunder) ... there’s going to be narratives that we can’t really pay attention to.
“We’ve got to control what we can. So much of these games has come down to who is going to start the fight from a physicality standpoint, take care of the ball better, rebound the ball better.
“Those are the important things that we need to focus on ... we’ve got to be ready to compete in game seven.”
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Monday’s title showdown in Oklahoma City will be the 20th game seven in Finals history, and the first since 2016 -- when the Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Golden State Warriors on their home floor to complete their comeback from a 3-1 series deficit and claim the title.
The LeBron James-led Cavs were the first road team to win a Finals game seven since 1978. Home teams are 15-4 in championship game sevens and Haliburton knows the Pacers face a monumental task in trying to polish off the 68-win Thunder on their home court.
“There’s no such thing as, like, a pretty game seven. They’re usually ugly bloodbaths,” Haliburton said.
“We’ve got to go in and just figure it out. These guys are going to play hard. They make shots at a higher clip at home. Their crowd is amazing.
“This is why we do what we do,” he added.
“This is the peak, the pinnacle of our sport.”
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