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The Indiana Pacers came so close to pulling off an upset playoff road win against the Boston Celtics Tuesday night. Indiana went toe to toe against the Celtics from start to end in large part because of a brilliant all-around effort by Pascal Siakam. The versatile forward was expected to play a huge role for the Pacers in the series opener and he looked great for the most part of the contest. He even duplicated a franchise feat only one man had ever done before in Pacers club history, per StatMuse.
The only Pacers in franchise history with
20+ PTS
10+ REB
5+ AST
in a Conference Finals game.
The Pacers suffered a deflating 133-128 loss to the Celtics in Game 1 that put Siakam's production to waste. It is also worth noting that it was Siakam who challenged Jaylen Brown's shot near the end of regulation that went in and forced overtime. That hurts Siakam and the Pacers but they can take heart from the fact that they made the Celtics sweat. They entered the game as a double-digit underdog and nearly completed a stunner at TD Garden. A moral victory doesn't reflect on paper but that's the best the Pacers could take away from their series-opening loss, notwithstanding the errors and poor decisions they made that led to their painful loss at the hands of Jayson Tatum and company.
Siakam finished Game 1 with 24 points on 12/23 shooting from the field, 12 rebounds, seven assists, and a steal. He probably has to be even more aggressive going forward in the series, considering that he got zero trips to the foul line in the Celtics game. However, it's seemingly an issue the Pacers, as a team, have been constantly dealing with since the playoffs started.
“The Celtics have the highest free throw differential (+93) this playoffs. The Pacers have the lowest free throw differential (-100) this playoffs,” shared StatMuse after Game 1.
So far in the 2024 NBA Playoffs, Siakam, who won a title in 2019 with the Toronto Raptors, is pacing Indiana with 21.1 points per game on 53.7 percent shooting from the floor, 7.5 rebounds, and 3.5 assists per contest.
The Pacers also got ample production in Game 1 from Tyrese Haliburton and Myles Turner, who had 25 and 23 points, respectively. Haliburton also dished out 10 assists, while Turner grabbed 10 boards to go with four assists and two blocks.
Back to the drawing board for the Pacers after brutal Game 1 loss to Celtics
Losing the series opener against the top seed in the Eastern Conference (and in the entire NBA, for that matter) in such a painful manner was definitely not the best way to kick off the conference finals round for the Pacers, but it is also worth mentioning that Indiana lost both Game 1s of their first and second-round series versus the Milwaukee Bucks and the New York Knicks, respectively. They even dropped the first two games of the Knicks series and trailed New York after five games before stitching together two wins in a row while staring playoff death in the eyes.
Siakam and the Pacers will look to get back on track and steal a win in Boston this coming Saturday before flying back to Indiana for Games 3 and 4. It will always be a tough assignment for the Pacers to take down a team like Boston, but the signs are there that they could do it.
