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
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