OKLAHOMA CITY – The Indiana Pacers led for exactly 0.3 seconds in Game 1 of the NBA Finals.
It just goes to show that it doesn’t matter how long you lead—just as long as you’re on top when the buzzer sounds.
Tyrese Haliburton buried another cold-blooded clutch shot to propel the Pacers to a 111-110 win against the heavily favored Oklahoma City Thunder, capping off Indiana’s latest great escape.
Six Pacers finished with double-digit scoring, including all five starters. Pascal Siakam led the way with 19. Reserve Obi Toppin added 17 and Myles Turner scored 15. Haliburton finished with 14 points, matched by teammate Andrew Nembhard, and Aaron Nesmith chipped in 10 points.
League MVP Shai-Gilgeous-Alexander led all scorers with 38 points.
The Pacers trailed by 15 points with less than ten minutes left in the fourth quarter, facing their largest deficit of the game after a botched inbounds pass from TJ McConnell led to a dunk from the Thunder’s Jalen Williams.
The play was emblematic of the game to that point. The Pacers, scrambling against OKC’s suffocating defense, were turning the ball over yet again. According to ESPN Stats, the Thunder’s chances of winning at that point were nearly 98%.
Unlike many of the Pacers’ numerous mistakes—they had 25 turnovers on the night—this one led directly to an Oklahoma City score. Coach Rick Carlisle, sensing the game was getting out of reach, called a timeout and shook up the entire lineup.
In: Haliburton, Nembhard, Nesmith, Toppin and Turner.
Out: McConnell, Bennedict Mathurin, Thomas Bryant, Ben Sheppard and Siakam.
The personnel change paid immediate dividends. In about two minutes of game time, the Pacers sparked a 9-2 run that cut into the lead.
The Thunder responded with a quick run of their own to push the lead back into double figures. Three-pointers from Toppin and Turner (on a bank shot) trimmed the lead to four.
OKC responded with a pair of free throws from Gilgeous-Alexander. After a shot from Turner and a pair of free throws from Jalen Williams made it 102-96, Haliburton hit a bucket to cut the lead back down to four.
That score held after a couple empty possessions from each team. Gilgeous-Alexander hit a driving layup to take a 104-98 lead. Haliburton missed a three-pointer and Gilgeous-Alexander hit a pair of free throws to make it 106-98—an eight-point lead.
Pascal Siakam, who’d reentered the game, got fouled after corralling an offensive rebound and hit one of two free throws. OKC pushed the lead to nine off two more free throws from Gilgeous-Alexander with 2:52 left.
A nine-point deficit with less than three minutes left?
No sweat.
Nesmith buried a three to pull within six. The Pacers got a stop on the ensuing possession and Nembhard responded with by coolly sinking a step-back three with 1:59 left. It was now a three-point game, and the boisterous OKC crowd was getting nervous.
The Pacers got another stop, but Lu Dort blocked Nesmith on the ensuing possession. Gilgeous-Alexander, as usual, had a response, hitting another bucket to make it 110-105.
It would be the Thunder’s final points of the night.
Nembhard drew a foul and sank the free throws to make it a three-point game. After another stop, with Siakam playing good defense and forcing a Gilgeous-Alexander miss, Nembhard tried for the equalizer.
His game-tying shot was off the mark, but Siakam knifed through the lane for the offensive rebound and putback. With 48.1 seconds left, it was now a one-point game at 110-109.
Williams drove for a bucket but missed, and the ball careened out of bounds as Siakam tried to get it under control. He and the ball went out of bounds, however, and the Pacers used a timeout to challenge the call. They believed OKC’s Cason Wallace pushed him out of bounds.
No luck there–the call stood. OKC ball with 22.1 seconds left and 14 seconds on the shot clock.
It’s no secret that the ball went to Gilgeous-Alexander. Facing intense pressure from Nembhard, he forced up a jumper that went off the back of the rim.
Nesmith gathered the rebound, and the Pacers went to work, getting the ball to Haliburton near midcourt. The Pacers star drove right and got enough space to pull up for the game-winner with 0.3 seconds left.
Oklahoma City’s last-gasp play went nowhere on the inbound.
Final result: Pacers 111, Thunders 110.
‘The first half was rough’
The win seemed unlikely enough. But if you talk to the Milwaukee Bucks, Cleveland Cavaliers or New York Knicks, there wasn’t much unlikely about it.
The Pacers have been the clutch team in the NBA Playoffs, and Haliburton has buried four shots this postseason that have tied or won a game with under five seconds on the clock.
The Pacers make these comebacks on nights when they’re not at their best. Remember, they trailed by 15 points in the fourth quarter. They trailed by nine with just a few minutes left. Yet, there they were at the end, inevitably, with a chance to win a game in which they turned the ball over 25 times against the NBA’s top defense.
Stay together. Play with pace. Get some stops.
“Just had to hang in. The first half was rough [with] 19 turnovers. The good thing was [surrendering] only nine points [off turnovers],” Carlisle said. “We were within reach of still being in the game. I think we won the third quarter by three, which was progress. Then they went up 15 and we just said, ‘Hey, just keep chipping away at the rock. Just keep pounding the rock and just chip away and hang in there.’”
Carlisle preached patience and ball security at halftime. His team listened—the Pacers turned it over just five times in the second half and never let the game get out of hand.
“Our biggest thing is our response,” Turner said. “We know things are going to be bad sometimes. Things are going to go good, but you’ve got to be even keel. Calm waters. I think we knew we had to value the ball a lot more. Started to put two hands and two eyes on the ball where we’re passing it. Keep the ball high. All the elementary stuff. It’s about going back to fundamentals. Little stuff like that.”
“This is all about keeping poise and at the same time having a level of aggression and those two forces fly in the face of each other a bit,” Carlisle said. “This arena is madness. The decibels were insane. There’s a lot going on. Grateful to have the chance to hang in there and give ourselves a chance at the end. But now we’ve got to keep our eye on the ball.”
Last year’s playoff run is fueling this year’s team. The Pacers made it to the Eastern Conference Finals last season before getting swept by the Boston Celtics. But many in the league doubted the run—other teams were missing key players due to injuries. The Pacers were determined to rise above it.
“I think today as a group… like I’ve said many times before, when you have a run like last year. when you get swept in the Eastern Conference Finals and how the whole conversation is about how you don’t belong there and how you lucked out to get there, that it was a fluke,” Haliburton said. “Guys are going to be pissed off. We spent the summer pissed off. And then you come into the year with all the talk about how it was a fluke.”
The Pacers struggled at the beginning of the season. Some analysts thought they’d miss the playoffs entirely after the sluggish start. Haliburton and the Pacers aimed to prove everyone wrong.
“I think as a group we take everything personal,” he said. “As a group. It’s not just me. It’s everybody. I feel like that’s the DNA of this group and that’s not just me. That’s our coaching staff who have done a great job making us aware of what’s being said. Us as players we talk a lot about it in the locker room. Talk about it on the plane.”
While the Pacers have full belief in themselves, a win in Game 1 doesn’t crown the next NBA champion, especially when the other team won 68 games in the regular season, holds home-court advantage and thoroughly dominated you for much of the game.
“This is the best team in the NBA and they don’t lose often,” Haliburton said. “We expect them to respond. We’ve got to be prepared for that. We have a couple days to watch film and get better. This game, if you look at all the numbers, it’s not the recipe to win. We can’t turn the ball over that much. We’ve got to do a better job at beating gaps… rebounding. We’ve got to do a better job all over the floor. Come May and June, it doesn’t matter how you get them. You get them.”
The Pacers and Thunder square off again Sunday night in Oklahoma City. Tip is scheduled for 8 p.m. The series shifts to Indianapolis for Game 3 on Wednesday.
