Indiana Pacers Beat Odds To Lead Cleveland Cavaliers Series 2-0

CLEVELAND – Cleveland Cavaliers 119, Indiana Pacers 112. That’s what the scoreboard read in Rocket Area with 48.0 seconds left in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Semifinal series between the Pacers and the Cavs, and Pacers star Pascal Siakam had just missed consecutive free throws. Despite a comeback effort, the result appeared to be decided in Cleveland’s favor.

Most who have consumed more than a few minutes of professional basketball would assume a seven-point deficit with under 50 seconds on the clock is a combination of time and score that all but decides a result. ESPN, who has a win probability model that uses historical data and updates live during games, said the Pacers had a 95.9% chance of losing after falling behind by seven in the final minute.

And yet – just like last week against the Milwaukee Bucks – the Pacers didn’t quit. Siakam’s second missed free throw wasn’t a death sentence for the team as wing Aaron Nesmith soared in for an incredible putback dunk to make it a five-point game. It was a huge play, both for the scoreboard and the momentum Indiana was building.

“The no, quit, resilient group that we have,” Pacers guard T.J. McConnell said of what keeps Indiana going in situations where they look finished. “We know we play to the final buzzer, and that’s what this group does best.”

How did the Pacers come back to beat the Cavaliers?

Still, being down five with under a minute to go is a nearly-impossible comeback for a team to pull off. With proper shot clock management, the group that is ahead should be able to simply run out the clock and make free throws to secure a victory. The game was still firmly in the Cavaliers grasp.

That was true until Cavaliers star Donovan Mitchell committed an offensive foul with 45 seconds to go. Siakam scored at the rim 18 seconds later and forced a Cavs timeout, but the stoppage did little to stop the home team from slipping. They threw the ball away on an inbounds pass coming out of the break, giving the Pacers the ball in a three-point game.

Star guard Tyrese Haliburton went to the cup and was fouled shooting the ball – and Haliburton was frustrated that he missed the shot. It would have given him one free throw attempt to tie the game. Instead, he was shooting two with his team down three.

He made the first, but missed the second at the charity stripe. It was a final chance for Cleveland to secure the win, but they couldn’t pull in the rebound. A masterful tip from Pacers center Myles Turner got the ball back to Haliburton in a two-point game with 12 seconds to go. The rest is history as the All-NBA guard found space from deep.

“I’m at peace with my game. [I have] an understanding that I’m trusted in these moments,” Haliburton said. “I have all the confidence in the world to make these shots.”

It seems impossible that a team can continue to get away with escaping from these situations. When Indiana trailed Milwaukee 118-111 with 40 seconds to go in Game 5 of their first round series, the game looked over. But the Pacers were victorious. ESPN gave them a 97.9% chance of losing with 39 seconds to go after a missed Bucks free throw, yet they took the series that night. To the Pacers, the odds mean nothing.

“We just hung in,” Pacers head coach Rick Carlisle said of the Game 2 win in Cleveland. “We’ve been in a lot of these situations this year and down the stretch of the season. Our group has a belief in one another, and our thing is [that] we just keep executing, we just keep playing.”

Backward looking win probability models overlook changes to the NBA. Comebacks are more plausible now that teams are limited in the number of timeouts they can call in the final two minutes of games, for example. NBA players and strategies improve every season. Perhaps the ESPN odds are slightly off. But that does not change how remarkable the Pacers victories are in these tight postseason battles.

Down seven with just seconds left in a game is an almost impossible situation to emerge from. Per ESPN Research shared by Jamal Collier, NBA teams have a record of 3-1,640 when trailing by seven in the final minute since the 1997-98 season. Yet Indiana has won twice in that situation in an eight-day span.

The odds and rule changes don’t matter when determining that the Pacers feat(s) are unbelievable. And the Pacers are up 2-0 in their second round series with the Cavs as a result.

“I don’t want to have to depend on it,” Pacers center Myles Turner said of the crazy comebacks. Combining the Pacers’ lowest-odds moment in the final minute of their two epic wins, they had a roughly 0.09% chance of winning both games. And yet, they did. “But it’s been very fun,” Turner added.

Another big win for the Pacers

It was another victory that Indiana needed to get. They were gifted an easier-than-expected outing with All-Stars Darius Garland and Evan Mobley out due to injury for the Cavs. Key reserve De’Andre Hunter missed the action, too.

Those absences alone don’t make the Cavaliers an easy roster to vanquish. Mitchell is still excellent, and he scored 48 points on Tuesday against the Pacers. Center Jarrett Allen is a former All-Star, and the team is full of role players who can shoot or defend. Cleveland nearly beat Indiana late in the regular season without four starters. They are still a great team without some of their top talent.

But they are still worse without Garland, Mobley, and Hunter. That’s why the Pacers had an opportunity to seize in Game 2 – going up 2-0 with a pair of road victories was on the table for the blue and gold.

They looked listless early. Cleveland went on a 28-6 run in the first quarter and led by 20 in the second frame. Indiana had too many turnovers and not enough defensive force. Their offense picked things up late in the first half, but they were trailing at halftime and looked weak compared to Game 1.

The Cavs edge reached 20 again when they used a Max Strus dunk to take an 81-61 lead with under 19 minutes to go. They were dominating to that point and appeared ready to even the series at 1-1.

“There’s a lot of stuff that I think we need to fix,” McConnell said after Game 2, acknowledging that there were struggles in the outing.

But as the final seconds showed, Indiana is resilient. They trimmed the 20-point margin to 14 quickly, and some impressive play from Bennedict Mathurin helped cut it to 11. The Cavs lead dropped to nine with 9:38 to go, then six, then five.

With 49 seconds to go, they were by seven. It looked like they did enough to hold the Pacers off. But everyone knows what happened next. The 20-point edge wasn’t enough, and Indiana pulled off another miracle in the final seconds to get out of Cleveland with two victories.

The Pacers had more cushion thanks to Cavalier absences, and they took advantage. It looked like a miracle, but is it really a miracle if the Pacers have done it twice in about a week? Carlisle was asked where this game ranks among the craziest ending sequences he has even seen.

“I don’t know. Did you see the one last week?” The Pacers head coach joked. His team is up 2-0 in the Conference Semifinals after the second epic close.