In transition from the Indiana Pacers’ 24th turnover of the night — the running theme of Game 1 of the NBA Finals — Jalen Williams dunked home a 94-79 advantage for the Oklahoma City Thunder with 9:42 remaining in the fourth quarter. The home team had controlled the entirety of the game, never trailing.
From there it all went to hell for Oklahoma City. Or the other way for Indiana.
Was it a comeback? Was it a collapse?
It was a bit of both, and it was as entertaining an opener to the league’s championship series as we have seen in some time. The Pacers outscored the Thunder 32-16 down the stretch, erasing a nine-point deficit in the final three minutes, to steal the game, 111-110, and home-court advantage in the best-of-seven set.
It marked the fourth improbable comeback of Indiana’s thievish playoff run, as the Pacers have stolen a game in each of their series. Against the Milwaukee Bucks in the opening round, they erased a seven-point deficit in the final 35 seconds of Game 5. Against the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference semifinals, they erased another seven-point deficit in the final minute of Game 2. And against the New York Knicks in the conference finals, they erased a 14-point deficit in the final three minutes of Game 1.
At the heart of each comeback was Indiana’s Tyrese Haliburton, a surging superstar. A driving layup with 1.3 seconds left ended the Bucks. A step-back 3-pointer with 1.1 seconds remaining gave the Pacers a 2-0 series lead, heading back home, in the second round. A wild, bouncing buzzer-beater sent a series opener against the Knicks into overtime, where Indiana stole home-court advantage in the conference finals.
New York never recovered from that stunning defeat. It is too early to tell whether OKC ever can.
And wouldn’t you know it: Haliburton was responsible for this theft, too, drilling a pull-up jump shot with 0.3 seconds remaining to give the Pacers their first lead of the night, 111-110. The Thunder had no answer.
Did Haliburton know it was going in?
“I had a good idea, yeah,” he said.
For good reason. They all seem to be going in these days.
“It’s a shot I’ve worked on a million times,” he added, “and I’ll work on it a million times more.”
Haliburton may have driven the getaway car, but Thursday’s theft required a team effort.
Following Williams’ slam, which gave the Thunder a 15-point lead with a shade under 10 minutes to play, Indiana head coach Rick Carlisle turned to his team and said, “Let’s just keep chipping away at the rock.” The Pacers registered three-point plays on three of their next four possessions. Andrew Nembhard powered home a layup — plus a foul shot — followed by 3-pointers from Obi Toppin and Myles Turner.
Suddenly we had a single-digit deficit, 96-88, for the first time since the opening seconds of the quarter. Thunder head coach Mark Daigneault called for a timeout to reinsert Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Chet Holmgren and Lu Dort into his closing lineup and to call a beautiful backdoor layup for Cason Wallace.
Indiana Pacers guard Tyrese Haliburton and his teammates celebrate as they leave the court after winning Game 1 of the NBA Finals as stunned OKC fans try to grasp what had just happened. (AP Photo/Nate Billings)
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That briefly pushed Oklahoma City’s advantage back to double digits, but Toppin and Turner each drilled another 3 to slice the lead down to 98-94, and we had ourselves a ballgame with six minutes still to play.
That is when we started to believe in the Pacers. When did they start to believe in themselves? “When I got off the bus,” said Haliburton. “When I put on my shoes. I mean, there was never a disbelief as a group, honestly.”
Over the next three minutes, Oklahoma City — mostly thanks to Gilgeous-Alexander — slowly built its lead back to 108-99 with 2:52 left, as SGA made his sixth and seventh free throws for his 35th and 36th points of the night. The young Thunder had faltered and regained control of the game. … Or did they?
Aaron Nesmith and Nembhard drilled two more 3s on Indiana’s next two possessions to make it a 108-105 game with 1:59 left. SGA, of course, answered, turning Lu Dort’s block of Aaron Nesmith into a layup on the other end. This is what OKC does, killing in transition, and they had, again, for what seemed like the thousandth time, wrested control of the game. That, or they would not score for the remainder of it.
Nembhard drew a foul from Oklahoma City’s Alex Caruso, draining both free throws: 110-107. Pascal Siakam blocked Gilgeous-Alexander at the rim. Nembhard missed a game-tying 3-point attempt, but Siakam snuck inside of Gilgeous-Alexander to grab the offensive rebound and put it back: 110-109.
If the game had not gone to hell for Oklahoma City, it had at least broken loose.
Williams missed a running jumper. Siakam and the Thunder’s Cason Wallace gave chase. Siakam landed with the ball out of bounds, but Indiana thought Wallace fouled him and challenged the call. The contact was ruled marginal, and the ball belonged to OKC. In the meantime, Carlisle had a message for his team.
“If it is their ball, let’s get the stop,” Carlisle told his charges, as they huddled during the officials’ review process. “There’s going to be a difference in the shot clock and the game clock, and if we get a stop and get the rebound, we’re going to go. Hopefully get the ball in Tyrese’s hands and look to make a play.”
Sure enough, Gilgeous-Alexander missed a clean look from 15 feet with 11 seconds remaining, and Nesmith secured the rebound. They found Haliburton, “and the rest,” as Myles Turner said, “is history.”
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