Basketball, She Wrote posts
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Indiana Pacers Player Reviews: Point Guards
Breaking down the seasons of Tyrese Haliburton, Andrew Nembhard, & T.J. McConnellBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper To wrap up our player review series, Tony Eastand I saved the deepest position for last, turning our attention to the playmaking ball-handlers on the roster, who each put their stamp on the game in a unique way. In that regard, whereas Tyrese Haliburton generally prefers to survey, looking here, there, and everywhere to manipulate weak...
Indiana Pacers Player Reviews: Power Forwards
Breaking downs the seasons of Pascal Siakam and Obi ToppinBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperWith the NBA Finals coming to an end on Monday night, teams can officially start negotiating with their own free agents, which means it's incredibly timely for Tony East and I to be turning our attention to the two most prominent fours on the roster -- as Pascal Siakam, who is an unrestricted free agent, and Obi Toppin, who is a restricted free agent, bot...
Indiana Pacers Player Reviews: Centers
Breaking down the seasons of Isaiah Jackson, Myles Turner, and Jalen SmithBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperWith Jalen Smith, Isaiah Jackson, and Daniel Theis all battling in training camp to emerge from the rotating back-up big carousel, the Pacers started the season with a lot of question marks at center. After several trips around the merry-go-round, with Smith overtaking Jackson during preseason and Jackson coming out on top in the playoffs, th...
Explain One Play: Four Verticals w/ Jenny Boucek
Going long with Jenny Boucek on the ins and outs of running routes in basketball By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperIt's officially the offseason for the Pacers, but the extended run to the Eastern Conference Finals opened the door for me to do something I've always wanted to do -- which is sit with an NBA coach and discuss the subtle details of a specific set or action. As you may recall, ahead of Game 4 against the Boston Celtics, Rick Carl...
Indiana Pacers Player Reviews: Shooting Guards
Breaking down the seasons of Bennedict Mathurin and Ben SheppardBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperAside from their names, Bennedict Mathurin and Ben Sheppard don't have much in common. One is a slashing wing, perhaps with star-caliber potential, and the other, while not yet proficient, projects as a spot-up shooting guard who could potentially multiply the advantages created by the stars around him. Right now, when Mathurin doesn't stay on t...
Indiana Pacers Player Reviews: Wings
Breaking down the seasons of Aaron Nesmith, Jarace Walker, and Doug McDermottBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper'Tisthe season for end-of-season coverage. As such, Basketball, She Wroteis teaming up once again with Tony Eastover at Locked on Pacersfor what has now become our annual player review series. Altogether, there's going to be five episodes in the format of what we're calling "The One" series, selecting oneplay, onenumber,...
Pacers End-of-Season Mailbag w/ Samson Folk
By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperAs promised, with the extended playoff run for the Pacers coming to an end, so too ends the extended podcast run with Samson Folk. To commemorate the occasion, our recap finale comes in the form of a mailbag -- answering all of your burning questions about where the Pacers go from here and what they should take from their unexpected trip to the Eastern Conference Finals.Also, to satisfy my promise of providing month...
A Star is Born
By: Samson Folk I @samfolkkI’m not sure anyone wants to rehash another blown lead. At least, I don’t really want to. Caitlin and myself will have one more podcast episode to eulogize what was an odd, but special playoff run. As I often do, I’d like to lean positive. So, I just want to highlight Andrew Nembhard.I’ve said it many times before, but he is one of the best driving guards in the NBA, and certainly amongst the younger crop of the...
How Andrew Nembhard finds the inside track
On Jrue versus Drew and the subtle nuances of hand-to-hand combat By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper It's Jrue Holiday's signature move. As chronicled by The Athletic's Eric Nehm,when the ball-handler dribbles the ball up the sideline against pressure and tries to get middle, Holiday pounces, slowing the opposing player down behind the 3-point line before absorbing the bump and stripping the ball cleanly without reaching across his body....
Pacers learn the (Nemb)hard way, trail 0-3 in series
By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperAfter leading by as many as 18 points, it was deja vu all over again for the Pacers, as the loud minority of mistakes that were made at the end of what became a narrow, 114-111 loss are now overshadowing the silenced majority of how they positioned themselves to potentially win - despite being without Tyrese Haliburton. In that regard, the depth at the point guard position certainly shined bright for the Pacers, pro...
Slipping Away
By: Samson Folk I @samfolkk A reminder: Caitlin’s deep dive comes later. This is just supposed to hold you over.In the first Dune movie, Gurney Halleck gruffly, and with a smile, says “I see you've found the mood.” to Paul Atreides. Paul had initially been resistant to meet the moment of their bit of sparring – which makes sense, not everyone has it in them to get physical and compete at the drop of a hat – but as aforementioned, a ...
Oshae then: Pacers go down 0-2 to Celtics
By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper Other than Pascal Siakam transforming into Atlas and strong-arming his team to within arm's reach of the Celtics, with Indiana trailing 56-51 headed into halftime with him scoring the final 10 points of the second quarter, the Pacers largely played tall rather than big. In fact, during the 18 minutes in which Boston played without a traditional center on the floor, Indiana got outscored by 15.3 points per 100 p...
System Failure
By: Samson Folk I @samfolkk A reminder: Caitlin’s deep dive comes later. This is just supposed to hold you over.It’s not fun to watch a vast array of failures over the course of 48 minutes. It’s pretty tough. It’s even tougher to watch it when you’re getting one of those huge performances that help swing games, but you fail to even put yourself in the swing zone - the bat path, maybe?The Pacers came into game 2 as the best offense in th...
Explaining the Inexplicable: Pacers throw away win
By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper After clawing out of 12-0 hole to start the game and taking a three-point lead with less than a minute to play, the Pacers looked poised to win until, well, they lost their poise. Suddenly, despite generating separation with a pair of self-created twos from Andrew Nembhard, which saw the Pacers readily find and pull on the loose string in Boston's tangled web of off-ball switches, Indiana let go of the rope, co...
The Definitive Pacers vs. Celtics ECF Preview
By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperAfter making all of the shots against the New York Knicks and setting an NBA record for field-goal percentage, the Indiana Pacers are headed back to the Eastern Conference Finals for the first time in 10 years, facing a Boston Celtics team that leads the league in net rating, true shooting percentage, and rebounding rate throughout the playoffs despite playing five of their nine games without Kristaps Porzingis. Dur...
Punch First, Punch Last
By: Samson Folk I @samfolkk A reminder: Caitlin’s deep dive comes later. This is just supposed to hold you over.All the quotes in the lead up to this echoed a similar sentiment. Game 7’s are weird. Game 7’s require the ultimate effort. Game 7’s are special.The war of attrition that had slowly chipped away at the Knicks and left the Pacers unaffected, well, it brought us to a game 7 where anything can happen. Heading into game 7, every Kni...
Pacers adapt to persist, force Game 7
By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper At first glace, "adapt" and "persist" may seem to run at cross-purposes. To adapt is generally synonymous with a readiness to change, whereas persistence is indictive of an indomitable will to press forward. And yet, the Pacers demonstrated a necessary mixture of both in Game 6. With Tyrese Haliburton being hounded by Deuce McBride for a second game in a row, Myles Turner could, in turn, be seen set...
Get Big Win Big
By: Samson Folk I @samfolkkA reminder: Caitlin’s deep dive comes later. This is just supposed to hold you over.Since the tip-off that started this series, the Pacers were looking at a couple very big advantages. Their depth and health were in better positions than the Knicks. They had the superior frontcourt, and more size. With the Knicks being the kind of team that defies convention – about anything, really – they battled like hell to shr...
Runaway McBride: Pacers go down 3-2 in series
And get toasted on the glassBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperNeverthe bridesmaid, always the McBride -- it seems. With Tom Thibodeau making the adjustment to start plucky guard Deuce McBride in place of Precious Achiuwa, it wasn't exactly a night to remember for the Pacers, as they attempted 29 fewer shots than the New York Knicks while giving up 20 offensive rebounds for 27 second-chance points and committing 18 turnovers. Meanwhile, the damag...
A night at the Garden
By: Samson Folk I @samfolkk A reminder: Caitlin’s deep dive comes later. This is just supposed to hold you over.There’s nothing quite like a superstar bending a game to their will. Jalen Brunson held the first half of game 5 and moved it around in his hand like puddy. Maybe the Knicks aren’t at their best when they’re so hyper-reliant on Brunson’s shotmaking, but they’re at the very least very good when they lean on it, and it’s as ...
How the Pacers ran (and wandered) over the Knicks
By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperThe Pacers lead by as many as 43 points, and the Knicks didn't score 50 points until there was 6:23 to play in the third quarter. As such, in evening the series 2-2 with a 121-89 blowout win, the Pacers didn't just look to deplete their depleted opponent, adding 15.1 points per 100 possessions in transition, they also wandered, collapsing from the four-man on defense to shadow the ball and clutter driving la...
On Aaron Nesmith & the village guarding Jalen Brunson
How the Pacers are reinforcing the length and tenacity of Nesmith by collapsingBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperIt was a tiny footnote of a key, momentum swinging play. With the Pacers trailing 98-94 with 8:06 to play in Game 3, Aaron Nesmith proceeded to execute the game-plan, hounding Jalen Brunson the full-length of the floor. For the game, Brunson scored 32.0 points per 100 match-ups when defended by Nesmith -- a considerably lower mark than th...
New Shirt: Agrarian Economy of Buckets
Heyyy, do you like t-shirts?By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperWith the Pacers advancing to the second round of the playoffs for the first time in 10 years, it only seemed fitting to add a new fit to the Basketball, She Wrote collection at Teepublic. For context, this look draws inspiration from the bucolic metaphor which my friend and co-host, Samson Folk, happened to, uh, farm during the debut episode of our playoff coverage."He will plant the ...
Pacers dig deep for Game 3 win over Knicks
By Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper The title to this video podcast is meant to reflect several different meanings. For the first time in this series, the starters for the Pacers not only were confronted by a late-game deficit but also surmounted it, matching the grittiness of the Knicks with extra efforts both on the glass and at the defensive end. Meanwhile, Tyrese Haliburton attacked the rim to the point of turning his ankle and taking a hard fall ...
On Andrew Nembhard's game-winner & the brink
Both of the three-point line and the seasonBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperIt's been somewhat of a conundrum. Since rejoining the starting lineup, when Tyrese Haliburton is orchestrating out of empty-side pick-and-roll, Andrew Nembhard will oftentimes stand nearly out of view, spacing high and a bit wide of the opposite slot. In effect, with his feet planted closer to the logo than the three-point line, this is communicating that his purpose i...
It's the shotmaking
By: Samson Folk I @samfolkk A reminder: Caitlin’s deep dive comes later. This is just supposed to hold you over.Counters and course corrections. Aaron Nesmith started out on Jalen Brunson and held him to one of his worst quarters of this young series. With a bit more size on ball – all the aggressiveness you can ask for – and less shooters on the floor for the Knicks? The Pacers had more license to help aggressively without blowing up the s...
Defensive holes result in 0-2 series hole for Pacers
On why there weren't enough stops and what else stopped the Pacers in Game 2 lossBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper A New York Knicks team that was already down by Julius Randle, Bojan Bogdanovic, and Mitchell Robinson scored 130 points against the Indiana Pacers while also sustaining injuries to Jalen Brunson, who missed time due to foot soreness in the first half, and O.G. Anunoby, who made an early exit and never returned with a hamstring inj...
Execution is King
By: Samson Folk I @samfolkkA reminder: Caitlin’s deep dive comes later. This is just supposed to hold you over.The two most important Indiana-centric things to start game 2? Nembhard's pressure defense – starting with full court pressure on Brunson – was really quite good to open the game. Also, Haliburton started seeing a bit more defense at the level and took advantage to burst into seams and get middle. Even if Haliburton isn't h...
Why the Pacers faded late in Game 1 loss to Knicks
By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperIn a surprise twist, the Pacers faded late against the New York Knicks with contributions from the bench only taking them so far when the starting lineups for both teams were back on the floor for the final seven minutes of the game. Put simply, rather than gaining steam, the Pacers ended up losing momentum, which was sapped by a combination of missed calls, late-game miscues, and whatever is leading the team's ...
On the "turning" point that should be a critical point
And why Indiana's star guard didn't star during the fourth quarterBy: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_CooperOver the final 6:55 of Game 1, when the starters for the Knicks were supposed to have run out of gas, it was the first unit for the Pacers who seemingly lost their verve, getting outscored 24-17, as Jalen Brunson nearly outscored Indiana all by himself (14). Maybe those numbers would look different if not for a few controversial calls? After a...
