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The Indiana Pacers shocked the basketball world by going up two games to one against the Oklahoma City Thunder in the NBA Finals, but they seemed poised to take it a step further on Friday night.
Through three quarters of Game 4, the Pacers looked like the better team. They led the Thunder 87-80 with just 12 minutes to play and seemed to have the Western Conference champs on the ropes in front of a wild pro-Pacers crowd at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.
In the fourth quarter, however, the script flipped. The Thunder outscored the Pacers 31-17 to walk away unscathed with a 111-104 win to even the series at two games each and reclaim home-court advantage before Game 5.
After the game, Pacers point guard Tyrese Haliburton pointed the finger at himself for his team's collapse with a chance to move to the brink of a championship.
Tyrese Haliburton takes accountability for the Pacers’ Game 4 loss:
“That’s on me. I gotta be better getting us down the stretch.” pic.twitter.com/XBhNKlDQSw
— Brett Siegel (@BrettSiegelNBA) June 14, 2025
“I've gotta do a better job keeping pace in the game,” Haliburton said. “I did a much better job of that last game, especially down the stretch, keeping pace, getting rebounds and really pushing. Think we've gotta do a better job of, when we do get stops, getting out and running. … That's on me. I've gotta get us playing faster down the stretch and I'll be better in Game 5.”
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Haliburton scored the final two field goals of the game for the Pacers on a pair of very difficult layups in the final minutes, but the last of those came with 3:20 left in the contest. Indiana score just one point — a Bennedict Mathurin free throw — from that point on, and it very well may have been its worst offensive sequence in the entire series.
The ball stopped moving for the Pacers and everything slowed down, forcing them into a lot of isolation possessions and late-clock prayers. While there is plenty of blame to go around for that, the onus falls on Haliburton as the star player and the point guard to get the team organized and help them get some good looks.
He failed to do that, and the Thunder came from behind in the fourth quarter to steal a huge win and get this NBA Finals back on level terms.
Haliburton has had plenty of clutch heroics in these playoffs. After all, he has made a game-winning shot in each of the Pacers' four playoff series, including in Game 1 in Oklahoma City. However, this was one of the few times where he came up short in the clutch, and his team is somewhat behind the eight-ball in this series as a result.
The Pacers have lost home-court advantage, but they are still two wins from a title in what is now a best-of-three series. They will get a chance to right the ship on Monday night in Game 5 in Oklahoma City.
