RealGM

Game number 52 of the season.

All Pacers are healthy. It's a home game against Grizzlies.
Grizzlies currently have record of 18-31. Expectations before the season were quite different. But injuries happened, other stuff happened too. That's why Grizzlies after 49 games already played have only 2 more Ws than the last place team in the West - Dallas Mavericks (16-35). Now Grizzlies are stuck in the middle of nowhere. No playoffs, no tanking, no rebuilding. Sucks for them.
Though Grizzlies record is 18-31, they are 7-6 in their last 13 games. Buttttt....... 7 victories (6 at home) were against teams with their current mutual record of 142-206. So, mehhhh....
Another thing. Grizzlies road record is 5-16. Only Atlanta is worse (4-20). All other teams have at least 6 victories.

Enough about Grizzlies, they know who they are and so we.

It's a home game for Pacers. Should be a piece of cake, right? Especially now, when everybody is healthy and Pacers are 7-1 in their last 8 home games. Butttttt......Remember what happened Saturday, January 27th? Myles was back from the injury. Orlando, depleted and with one of the worst road records in the NBA (6-20) was in town, sounds familiar?
Let me remind you of the drama that followed. After first quarter Pacers were down by 10 points (22-32). Second quarter was the sequel of the first. Pacers down 36-53, 41-60, 46-66, 48-69 (the biggest margin in the game), 50-70 with 5 seconds to play after Khem Birch (who is Khem Birch?) made second free throw after missing first. And suddenly, the sign of the future - Darren Collison made buzzer beater three pointer, cutting Magic's lead to 17 points.
We all remember what happened in the second half. Indiana Magic happened. Domas, Dipo happened and dug in. And everybody else too. Lance happened again. Scored 11 points with 12:37 left to play.
And final shot by Magic's Jonathon Simmons happened too. By the all rules of perfect drama, that shot had to go in, but it didn't. Lucky us.

After such unexpected thriller I thought that home game against Hornets would be less stressful. Hornets not a good road team too (6-15 so far for the season). But still, game was a nail biter till the end. if not Myles Turner, Hornets might had a chance to improve their road record.
Myles stats for the game; 21 minutes, 22 pints (8-11, 4-6 from the distance, 2-2 from the stripe). That's very nice, but this is NBA. Players put up some crazy numbers sometimes (like one guy, who scored 8 points in 9 seconds). what I want to point out - Myles had three assists. That number impressed me most.

After all this typing - LET"S GO PACERS!. Play like you can, want and like. DO NOT TAKE GRIZZLIES FOR GRANTED (read above). We need those Ws in the standing. Those Ws will help Pacers claim #2 spot in the East before the playoffs (high expectations makes me high )

Well said.

Not much I can add.

Goooo Pacers

I'm hoping to see this team come out and take care of business against a sub-.500 team. None of that falling behind early crap.

Also:

boomershadow wrote:I'm hoping to see this team come out and take care of business against a sub-.500 team. None of that falling behind early crap.

Related to basketball. And related to any game.

I watched Bulls winning 6 rings in Chicago. Phil Jackson, among many other things, is a grand master of mind's games. Phil was very direct with his approach to sub .500 teams: he made them clearly understand that they have ZERO chances of having a successful encounter.

Sport is competitive. If you are good - you know it. And knowing that, you can not to play down to the level of competition.

Gotta take care of games like these if we wanna climb the standings.

No Evans for the Grizzlies. Apparently there might be a trade in the works?

Bogie still starting. Bogie, if everything around you is collapsing and falling apart, remember one thing - you still have your balls.

Bogie my god... He lost it.

I don't know. I have a feeling. Confident W for Pacers.

They're trying to get Bojan going.

Domas!

They're hitting a LOT of shots... we gotta come out with some defensive intensity in the 2nd half

Thad Young's one man fast break that ended in a charge is all the proof I need that he doesn't really belong at the 3 at all.

Team was kinda lethargic in the first half, especially Dipo. It looks to me like he tried to defer at the start and never really got it going. I'm sure that he'll do a lot better in the second half.

Myles was good. He was very aggressive in the post early and earned 6 FTs in the first 3-4 minutes.

We need to play better in the second half if we want to make sure that we win tonight.

I don't think it's entirely our fault. The Grizzlies seem to be playing pretty well considering their roster.

Domas doesn't look 100% healthy. Maybe D12 last game broke a bone in Domas body, but I doubt it. One thing Lithuanian kids learn early - broken bones are not an excuse for poor play.
Couple times during last ~5 years Domas played "under the weather". Why I am mentioning this? Because, actually, it was more than couple times. It's a flu season, with plenty of some nasty new bugs. And it's cold in Indiana (I know, because I just had a smoke outside in Chicago). Anyway, whatever reason, teammates need to chip in. We need simple wictory. Drama will be saved for the deep run during post season.

So many missed opportunities.

OK Bogie, you good. You look like yourself so far.

Way to go Myles!