The Indiana Pacers secured a win in their season opener, beating the Pelicans 123-120; however, they still have things to improve to have a successful season. Despite the strong performances from Tyrese Haliburton and Pascal Siakam, the Pacers have plenty of room for improvement. As Indiana prepares to face the Dallas Mavericks in their home opener, there are a few crucial areas the Pacers will need to address to secure another victory and build early-season momentum.
How The Indiana Pacers Can Improve
Offensive Consistency
For the majority of the game versus New Orleans, Indiana’s offense played well together, but in the second quarter, the Pacers’ offense completely stalled out. Indiana started strong with 38 points in the first quarter, but lost all momentum in the second quarter, scoring only 18 points compared to New Orleans’ 35. When their offense is working well, they have proven how dangerous their offensive attack can be, but when they are unorganized, it can be detrimental to the outcome of the game, as the second-quarter slump Indiana faced almost cost them the game.
The Pacers’ offense relied heavily on Siakam and Haliburton, as the two combined for 53 of the team’s points. Haliburton looked great in the season opener, silencing some of the questions about how his prolonged absence would impact his play, proving he still looks like one of the NBA’s best facilitators. However, Indiana cannot rely solely on Haliburton; they need to prove they generate offensive production without him as well. Other players are completely capable of scoring, and it will be important for the team to sustain offensive production outside of Siakam and Haliburton if they want to be true contenders this season.
For the Indiana Pacers to gain offensive consistency, they need to focus on slowing down when their original offensive play breaks down. When the Pelicans prevented Indiana from scoring on their initial play, the rest of the possession started to spiral into disorganization and usually resulted in a difficult and unnecessary shot being taken. When this happens, the Pacers should reset and return to clean offensive movement, creating a scoring opportunity for whoever gets some space, finding a way to give someone a chance for a high-quality shot.
Limiting Fouls
On both sides, Wednesday’s game was extremely sloppy and was full of fouls. Indiana needs to play much cleaner basketball to eliminate playing in games that come down to the wire. Versus the Pelicans, the Pacers had 26 personal fouls, sending the Pelicans to the line 37 times. New Orleans took advantage of the Indiana Pacers’ foul trouble, shooting 34-for-37 on free throws. To put it into perspective, last season, the league average in free throw attempts per game was 28.3, and the Pelicans had 37 attempts. The Pacers need to fix this immediately, because giving up an abundance of free throws will make winning against stronger teams much more of a challenge.
On the bright side, Indiana won despite giving up so many free throws. A good takeaway from this is that Indiana continued to be resilient throughout the game, fighting and keeping the physicality up even when they were down, eventually leading them to come back and win.
Winning The Rebounding Battle
The Indiana Pacers have struggled to be a strong rebounding team the last few seasons, and addressed that problem by trading for Ivica Zubac. The new Pacers’ big man recorded an impressive 15 rebounds in the season opener, doing as he was expected in the season preview for the Pacers’ centers. Despite a strong showing from the Pacers’ X-factor, Indiana still lost the rebounding battle, recording 43 total rebounds compared to New Orleans’ 49.
The Pelicans also had 14 offensive rebounds, which gave them many opportunities at second-chance points. The Indiana Pacers need to do a better job at limiting offensive rebounds, and that starts by getting more players involved in defensive rebounding instead of relying on Zubac alone. Siakam had eight rebounds, and Jarace Walker had six, but rebounding from other players was rare. Indiana doesn’t need to dominate the glass, but they do need to limit teams from collecting offensive rebounds in order for them to give their offense more opportunities to control the pace of the game.
The Last Word
The Indiana Pacers had a good showing versus the Pelicans. From the looks of it, Haliburton could return better than ever, and signs show he hasn’t been slowed down by his injury. However, their rebounding issues, excessive number of fouls, and lack of offensive consistency are areas that need to be addressed. As the Pacers prepare to take on the Mavericks, it will be important to see how their struggles against the Pelicans are addressed in their home opener.
Featured Image: Stephen Lew-Imagn Images
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