The Indiana Pacers: Putting Together The Pieces Of The Puzzle

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While a lot of the attention in the offseason has been switched on to the Warriors and the Knick this offseason, the Pacers have been building a masterpiece under the radar. Let's take a look at the significance of the roster they've been putting together.

Jeff Teague- This point guard comes from the 2014-15 coach of the year, Mike Budenholzer who transformed the whole Hawks team. This was a team that was second in defensive rating in the league last season, only falling behind the Spurs. However, as good as this team was, they didn't have a superstar which hurt their chances dearly of scoring when it came to the playoffs. Now Jeff Teague is a guy that likes to get the offense going. He is a fast paced guard. One of the biggest things Teague brings to the floor though, is his shooting. Last year, Monta Ellis had a rough year. The paint was very tight and his offense didn't thrive. Now that Teague, a 40% 3-point shooter and a great player off the dribble, is on the team, this will open up the paint for the rest of the team.

Myles Turner- This guy made his mark in the playoffs last year. He's proven he has a place in the league. His toughness mentality is amazing and you know he'll be learning a lot from big Al Jefferson on toughness. This just might be Myles Turner's break out season as he didn't really have a chance last season to do so. Expect big things from him defensively.

Paul George: He is star of the team. Of course with Paul George, you will know what you're getting out of him, a lot of offense and a lot of defense. With a small forward that can guard guys like KD and LeBron James you know that Pacers are going to have an easier time winning against these elite teams.

Thaddeus Young: This is probably one of the most underrated acquisitions that have happened this off-season. Thaddeus Young is known to be a good solid defender. He is one of the leading power forwards in steals for a few years now. Young has a pretty good post game and can somewhat stretch the floor. But the ability to put the ball on the deck and rebound efficiently from the power forward sport is what stands out. Young is an athletic power forward. He can drive better than most of them. And to top that off, he can rebound. This left handed big men is a big piece since the Pacers lacked good big men last season. Young brings a lot to the table that a lot f power forwards don't have. He cuts and runs the floor. You know him and Teague are going to be having a great time in transition.


Monta Ellis: This year is the year that Monta Ellis has a comeback year. It was rough for him, but for two reason. Number 1, he didn't have many big men to play pick and roll/pop with. This year he has Jefferson and Young. Number 2, with more shooters the paint will be open more. I have a good feeling about Ellis this year.

The Bench: Al Jefferson is going to be the guy to come off the bench to destroy the other team. They are going to ask him to score and rebound. He will be used constantly in pick and roll with Paul George, Monta Ellis, and Jeff Teague a ton.

Aaron Brooks is the guy that I'm so happy they grabbed, besides D.J. Augstine, I think Aaron Brooks is one of the best bench players you could have. This is a guy that is know to be able to shoot and score. But not only can he score, he has a big effect on his teammates. His ability to pass is amazing. The acquisition of Brooks is very important to the success of the Pacers success.

The other players they have, guys like Rodney Stuckey and and C.J. Miles can just flat out score. Glenn Robinson III might be a guy that can really provide a lift offensively as well as Joe Young. They also have a good defensive center in Rakeem Christmas if someone were to go down. Their bench is something that they can count on.

As you can see, the Pacers are on track to win this season. If they can stay healthy, their limit is unknown.  They are going to be a very fast paced team that is going to push tempo. To me, they have a roster that has a chance at taking down the Cavs. I can't wait to see this team in action!

Hawks VS Celtics (Game 1)

Hawks Lead Series 1-0

This game was a tale of 2 halves. Boston lost the first half, Atlanta lost the second. After watching this whole game, I realized that this was going to be an interesting series.

If you take a look at the first half, the Celtics played very poorly. Jae Crowder shot just 1-10 from the floor and Isaiah Thomas shot just 2-8. The team shot just 23.1% from the field, 12.5% from 3, and ended the half with just 34 points. They also had no fastbreak points! Defensively, the Celtics seemed late on every defensive rotation, the help side was always late, and they gave up 26 points in the paint.

Boston's 1st half - shot chart - www.nba.com/stats

As for the Hawks, their big men dominated. Horford, Millsap, and Bazemore had a combined 31 points. Boston's big men were just too slow to react to the guards and the bigs of the Hawks. Jeff Teague was doing a wonderful job of making the extra pass to find the big man off the high pick and roll that Millsap and Horford thrive in. The Hawks were doing great.

The second half came around and the Celtics did a great job of defending the pick and roll. Everyone was on the same page. Crowder and Thomas stepped up their game and the Celtics picked up their percentages. They shot 50% from the field and 47.4% from deep in the second half. The big thing that brought them back into the game was transition. The Celtics went from having no fastbreak points in the 1st half to having 15 in the 2nd.

As for the Hawks, their bench couldn't convert in the second half and Korver was just brutal. He has 0-7 from 3 on the game. They were well defended, but the Hawks just didn't get back in transition. What won the Hawks the game was their late game defense. They made sure that every shot was contested and defended the ball handler really well. They executed in the last few minutes which got them the win.

While the Celtics lost, if they had a different 1st half, it could've been a much different game. I am very excited for this series as it continues and I think this could come down down to an amazing game 7. It will really depend on who wins, Atlanta's frontcourt or Boston's backcourt.

Hawks VS Cavaliers (game 1)

Final Score: Cavs win 97-89



Cavaliers lead series 1-0

This was a really weird game. The Hawks build up a lead. Then the Cavs catch up. J.R. Smith knocks down a bunch of shots. The Hawks fall way behind. DaMarre Carroll gets injured. Then the Hawks fall behind a lot but catch up a little. The Cavs ended up winning in the end. Really odd game and a lot happened. Let's take a look.

• 1st Quarter: The Hawks played great in the first quarter. They had a 26-20 lead at the end of the first quarter. They limited LeBron to just 1-3 shooting and he had just 2 points. At that point though, the Cavs lead the rebound advantage 15-6. Jeff Teague had 9 points in the quarter. Kyrie Irving had 2 threes and Tristan Thompson and Timofey Mozgov had a combined total of 11 rebounds.
• 2nd Quarter: This quarter was a little different. By the end of the quarter the game was tied and the Cavs had scored 31 points in the quarter. LeBron shot 7-9 in that quarter and had 14 points. J.R. Smith had 3 threes in the quarter and shot only 4. Only 4 Cavs players scored in this quarter. Matthew Dellavedova missed all 4 shots he took including 3 three pointers. Jeff Teague had 8 points in the quarter. Kyle Korver didn't even take a shot as he was the only one that didn't score on the Hawks that quarter. The Hawks had a total of 5 turnovers in that quarter.
• 3rd Quarter: In this quarter, the Hawks only made 4 shots. 4 shots! They shot 23% from the floor. What saved them? Paul Millsap's free throws of course. He was 5-6 from the free throw line. The team was 7-8. The Hawks were outscored 23-16 in that quarter. The Hawks also had 5 turnover in the quarter again. They did do a better job on LeBron as he had shot just 1-5 in the quarter but LeBron shot 4-4 from the free throw line. J.R. Smith had 8 points in that quarter.
• 4th Quarter: Now this was just a disaster for the Hawks. DeMarre Carroll ended up getting injured. Then Paul Millsap was just getting sick of LeBron and could not guard him. Millsap ended up getting a technical for arguing. The Hawks only made 1-8 from the 3 point line in the quarter. And J.R. Smith hit 3 threes in the quarter. Again, only 4 Cavs players scored in that quarter. LeBron had 9 points. The Hawks ended up loosing the game.

The Hawks just have to play LeBron better. I think the main thing is just that they have to get Kyle Korver involved in the game more. Also, they can't have 10 turnovers in 2 consecutive quarters. That kills them. They also just need to shoot better. They need Korver to just take shots. The Hawks can't be shooting 4-23 from 3 point range. Hopefully Carroll recovers fast and the Hawks can have a better game.

Hawks VS Wizards (game 5)

Final Score: Hawks win 82-81



Hawks lead series 3-2

Horford Traveled. That's the first thing I yelled when I saw that play. I waited for the call. It never came. I left the room so mad, not because the Hawks won, but because the NBA rules and the refs let the team win the game illegally. You can't replay this and fix it and all 3 refs missed the travel. However, the Wizards made some mistakes themselves, let's take a look.

The Wizards need to do better with help defense. they don't help and then the wrong people help and then others don't cover the people they should have been covering. It was just a mess. I looked at every defensive play that the Hawks scored on and over half of them had problems with help defense. This is a problem that needs to be addressed. They really need to fix this problem. Next, Gortat doesn't read what the defense is doing. If he is double teamed he puts up a shot and if he has a lane, he doesn't take it. They did a good job of finding the open guy on the weak side though. They also have situations where they need to do better on screens. There was poor communication and that needs to be addressed. They sometimes need to switch and sometimes need to get back on their man. The defense for the Wizards was just horrible.

The Hawks played good overall. They did have streaks where they missed shots and committed a lot of turnovers at once. They had 23 turnovers total. They also need to get back on their man and stop double teaming people. They really need to cut down on that. Jeff Teague looked lost on defense a lot of times. He just looked like he didn't know what was happening, he would walk away from his man. Someone else would guard him and he would just stand there and not find someone. He was really lazy and it just wasn't Teague. I don't know if he was tired or whatever, but he needs to play better defense. Mike Muscala played great defense and did a great job setting screens. He slipped a couple of the screens which got him great open looks. He also did a great job of using pump fakes and pass fakes. The Hawks need to win 1 of their next 2 games. Can they do it? Well, they have some mistakes to fix first.

Hawks VS Wizards (game 4)

Final Score: 106-101



Series tied 2-2

This was a crucial game. A must win for the Hawks. They needed to win or else, elimination could have been right around the corner. How did they win, and what do they need to do next game. Let's take a look.

Jeff Teague hit a very clutch 3 pointer. Teague just had a great game. You could tell, he didn't want to lose. He hit shots, but he also found his teammates open in the lane and on the perimeter. Dennis Schroder did a great job of attacking the rim. I was very impressed with that. This Hawks team needs to play better perimeter defense as they are allowing too much on the inside and from 3. The Hawks had a total of 30 assists and it wasn't just one person contributing to that. 3 people had at least 6 assists. One thing that they should do is try to get Kyle Korver involved in the offense more. He has been horrible this series and they need to get him going. The thing I loved the most was how they got Horford involved in the offense. Horford had a total of 70 touches and he got off 18 shots.

The Wizards are suffering without John Wall. They miss the passing effect he has had on the game. If someone was open, he would get them the ball. Without him, it's tough. Ramon Sessions doesn't have nearly the offensive or defensive game that Wall has. Players have stepped up though. Will Bynum has played great and he had 10 points off the bench in the last game. Bradley Beal played a great game but he couldn't carry his team. He 34 points, 6 rebounds, 7 assists, and a big block on Schroder. He needs others to make shots though. Without John Wall, that's hard to do. Can they win without John Wall? Tell me what you think.

Hawks VS Wizards (game 2)

Final Score: Hawks win 106-90



Series tied 1-1

John Wall was out. There was really no leader for the Wizards. The Hawks really did take control of the game. Let's take a look at what the Wizards need to improve on as they go back home.

The Wizards need John Wall. Simple as that. This guy averages over 10 assists per game. He runs the offense. He is like a Ricky Rubio that can score better. When he is on the floor, everyone plays so much better. Take a look at this, the Wizards took more contested shots than uncontested shots. That is a sign of lack of ball movement. Next, Nene and Gortat only had a combined 12 points. Wall's ability to get it low to the posts is better than anyone else in the league. Wall is like Chris Paul dishing to DeAndre Jordan and Blake Griffin or Rubio dishing to Kevin Love or Pekovic (throwback to last year). When you take away Chris Paul and Ricky Rubio, what do you have, 2 bigs having to try really hard just to touch the ball. What did they do great of? Ramon Sessions played great. He had a great second half. Paul Pierce shot great from the three point line. In fact the whole team shot 54.5% from deep, which is very impressive for a team like the Wizards. Last, they contained Jeff Teague to only 9 points.

The Hawks played a great overall game. They had 10 turnovers but made them all up with 10 steals. Everybody went for every loose ball and played their hardest. They had great ball movement and wanted to get everyone involved. One thing they could do better is get Kyle Korver some more touches. This guy only had 14 points off of only 40 touches. He needs the ball more. His usage was the lowest on his team at 13.2%! That is unacceptable. Other than that they look like they are in great shape for the next game as long as they play the same in game 3.

Hawks VS Nets (game 5)

Final Score: Hawks win 107-97



Hawks lead series 3-2

The Hawks got their game together. And Deron Williams lost his again. I guess it was just a one game kinda deal. The Hawks could put it away next game. Let's breakdown what they have to do.

The Hawks have done okay in this series but they picked it up in this game to the great old Hawks like the time they won all those game in the regular season. I really want to give credit to Jeff Teague who had 9 of his 20 points and 3 of his 8 assist in the 4th quarter. He was such an important in the fourth. Horford just needs to keep doing what he's doing. He had a double-double of 20 points and 15 rebounds with 2 blocks and 2 steals to go along with that. One thing that bothered me was Paul Millsap's play. He only had 10 points in the game. It wasn't much of a concern though. He just couldn't hit shots. In fact, he passed the ball, set screens and really helped out his team. He just couldn't hit shots. Hopefully he can do better next game and the Hawks can put this series away.

The Nets played okay. They played great in the fourth but the Hawks always had an answer on the offensive end. Alan Anderson had a great game coming off the bench. He ended the game with 23 points and 7 rebounds. Deron Williams had 5 points in the game. Not to mention, the team was horrible with him on the court. Deron Williams had a low offensive rating of 97.8 and a horrible defensive rating of 117 when he was on the court. They played best when Jarrett Jack was on the floor. People that say it's because Deron Williams is playing with his ankle hurt, I don't buy that one bit. Deron Williams ran a total of 2.26 Miles while running an average of 4.14 MPH. So don't tell me that he's hurt. The team did great from three point range and I would look for them to shoot more threes. Other than that, there isn't much they can do.