Pacers News: Rick Carlise Reveals What's 'Different' With Indiana From Last Season
A year removed from posting a 47-35 record and making a surprise run to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2024, the Indiana Pacers find themselves mired in the depths of a sub-.500 start to their 2024-25 season, 10-14. Following the team's 132-123 victory against the Chicago Bulls on Friday night (who fell to an identical 10-14 record), Indiana has reached the East's No. 9 seed.
Now, Pacers head coach Rick Carlisle isn't sugarcoating the qualitative drop-off for this year's squad. It seems to have been a bit of a death by a million cuts.
The team's pace-and-space offense has been slowed by two-time All-NBA power forward Pascal Siakam, who as the club's best and most consistent scorer has naturally garnered been given significant leeway with the ball. The long-term absences of starting wings Andrew Nembhard and Aaron Nesmith has hurt the Pacers defensively. All-NBA point guard Tyrese Haliburton seems to still be struggling through a hamstring strain incurred during the 2024 playoffs.
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Speaking after a recent 130-106 blowout home loss to the young and hungry Detroit Pistons, Carlisle attempted to unpack why his Pacers this year have fallen short of expectations, per Dustin Dopirak of The Indianapolis Star.
"We were not physical enough," Carlisle said of that particular defeat. "Obviously not tied together well enough defensively and we've gotta do better. [The Pistons] were more physical and played with more attitude from the very beginning of the game. It carried through."
Carlisle went on to espouse the issues that have befallen the club more cumulatively this season.
"It's a different configuration for sure," Carlisle said. "This is different. Their styles are all unique. That's why I've been saying, this year's not like last year. The pieces so far have been different, particularly when you have some of your main guys out. It's taken some time and it's taken some effort to make it work better and better, hopefully. It's ongoing."
Against the Chicago Bulls in a 132-123 road win on Friday, however, some stuff seemed to turn around.
Haliburton led Indiana in scoring, notching 23 points on 9-of-17 shooting from the field (5-of-9 from long range), eight assists, four rebounds, and two steals. He was a big part of the Pacers' ability to pull away from Chicago in the game's second and third quarters. The team's 3-point shooting was elite. Indiana went 18-of-30 from deep (60 percent). While Chicago took a whopping 20 more triple tries, the Bulls only made three more than the Pacers did (42 percent).
Defensively, against an undersized Chicago squad (outside of 6-foot-10 center Nikola Vucevic), Carlisle often threw out as many as three power forward-sized bodies at a time to dissuade the Bulls around the rim, forcing Chicago to stay outside.
Whether this was a fluke or the beginning of a turnaround, on both ends of the floor, remains to be seen.
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