After taking down the scrappy New York Knicks in Game 7 at Madison Square Garden with an incredible shooting performance, the Indiana Pacers have advanced to the Eastern Conference Finals to be underdogs once again against the top-seeded Boston Celtics.
On Tuesday night, the Pacers didn’t have much time to prepare for the rested Celtics, but it didn’t seem to matter, as they gave Jayson Tatum and company all they could handle at TD Garden in Boston.
The Pacers seemed to have the game in hand down the stretch as they had a three-point lead with only a few seconds left on the clock in the fourth quarter, but a remarkable game-tying shot in the corner by Jaylen Brown resulted in sending the game into overtime.
The Celtics took over the game in overtime, outscoring the Pacers 16-11 to get the first win of the series on their home floor.
After the game, the reactions were mostly the same, with everyone jumping on the Pacers for ruining an ideal situation to get on top of the Celtics early in the series, with Adam Schein of “Mad Dog Sports Radio” calling it a “choke job” by Indiana.
“An unacceptable choke job from the Pacers,” Schein said.
“An unacceptable choke job from the Pacers!”@AdamSchein rants after Indiana gave away game 1 to the Boston Celtics.
🔊: https://t.co/RTimOxppxf
🎥: https://t.co/FuD3jmPDxA pic.twitter.com/q3ensdhV6m— Mad Dog Sports Radio (@MadDogRadio) May 22, 2024
Even though the Pacers may have choked in Game 1, Indiana proved they can play with the No. 1 seed in the East and are more than prepared to potentially pull off the series upset in order to advance to the NBA Finals.
It’ll be interesting to see how the Pacers come out in Game 2 and if the team can even things up at one game apiece before the series shifts to Indiana for Game 3 and Game 4.
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