It’s safe to say the Indiana Pacers didn’t take Friday’s game lightly. The Pacers controlled the game from start to finish and scored at will to beat Boston 123-114 at TD Garden. It’s never easy playing the same opponent twice in three days, and Boston found out the hard way after cruising to victory two nights ago.
The Pacers had Andrew Nembhard back after he missed Friday’s game and he proved to be a difference maker. In addition to Nembhard, Tyrese Haliburton hurt the C’s all night finishing with 31 points, but it was his ability to get into the paint at ease and either making a shot or finding a teammate. The Pacers scored 66 points in the paint.
Whenever Boston went on a run, Indiana did a great job of answering with a run of its own. A 13-0 run midway through the final quarter sealed the game for Indiana.
The Pacers opened the game scoring its first three shots, while the Celtics missed their first three shots to give Indy an early 6-0 lead. Sam Hauser got Boston on the board with a straightaway three, his first in two weeks.
Indiana made six of its first seven shots with every starter scoring besides Bennedict Mathurin. Joe Mazzulla was forced to call his first timeout with his team trailing 12-5.
16 of Indiana’s first 18 points were all in the paint as Boston struggled early to contain Indy’s perimeter players.
Jordan Walsh joined Payton Pritchard as the first two guys off the bench with under six minutes left in the opening quarter.
Boston, behind Jaylen Brown’s five straight points, cut the lead to four (21-17) which led to Rick Carlisle to call a timeout as Boston started to find its rhythm on offense.
After a Sam Hauser three to cut it to two, Payton Pritchard drilled a three on the following possession to give Boston its first lead of the game (23-22) with three minutes left in the first. After the three, Carlisle took his second timeout.
Indy fired back with a 5-0 run, but that run was halted by another Pritchard three with 1:18 left. For a two-for-one opportunity, Jaylen banged a step back three over Pascal Siakam to retake the lead 29-27. The three was Brown’s 12th point of the game to go with three assists and two rebounds.
After a slow start, Boston took a two-point lead into the second quarter.
In the second quarter, Tatum was looking for his shot and getting to the free throw line. Tatum visited the charity stripe twice in the first two and a half minutes to get going offensively. However, back-to-back Thomas Bryant dunks gave the Pacers a four-point lead (thanks to an 8-3 run to start the quarter) which led to a Mazzulla timeout.
Boston got into the bonus early with 7:27 left in the half.
In the first quarter, the Pacers were dominating the paint, but it was back-to-back threes from Haliburton and Jarace Walker that gave Indy a six-point lead midway through the quarter.
Pritchard then scored eight points in a row, unfortunately the Pacers offense continued to hit baskets after each PP basket and with 3:40 remaining in the half, Boston trailed 57-49.
Despite Tatum being aggressive early in the quarter, he didn’t make his first field goal until 2:11 left in the second quarter. Before the made basket, Tatum was 0-for-7 from the field (0-6 from three).
Boston, without Jrue Holiday, struggled in the first half to contain Andrew Nembhard who finished the half with 14 points.
Despite it being a bad half defensively, Payton Pritchard drilled a three right before the buzzer sounded to make it a 65-58 halftime deficit. The three moved Pritchard ahead of Avery Bradley for ninth place in all time three-pointers made in Celtics history according to Celtics.com’s Taylor Snow.
Credit to Indiana for its first half shooting. The Pacers shot 58.1% from the floor and 35.7% from three, compared to Boston’s 52.4% from the field and 37% from beyond the arc. Boston allowed Indiana to score 36 of their 65 points in the paint.
Pritchard led the Celtics in the first half scoring with 19 points (13 points in the second quarter) with Brown right behind with 18 on 8-of-10 shooting.
It was a good start from Boston to begin the third quarter, especially for Jaylen Brown who scored back-to-back and-1s for a quick six points to cut the Pacers lead to three (76-73) with 8:19 remaining.
The Celtics continued to struggled to keep Indy out of the paint. The Pacers continuously exploited the Celtics game plan when they switched in the half court.
For every run Boston goes on, Indiana found a way to respond with a run of its own. Indiana continued to get into the paint, and with Porzingis out there was no rim protecting big for Boston. The Pacers scored 46 of their 89 points from the paint.
When the crowd was starting to get restless, Jayson Tatum blocked Myles Turner at the rim which led to a Derrick White layup to make it 89-83 leading to a Pacers timeout.
Indiana went into the fourth quarter leading 98-91. Tatum scored 12 points in the third, while Indiana continued to dominate paint scoring with over half of their points (50) coming in near the hoop.
The fourth quarter was sloppy for both teams as the Pacers and Celtics kept giving away the ball with unenforced turnovers. However, Indiana extended its lead to 11, 105-94 with 9:04 left.
With 8:23 left Al Horford hit his first three-pointer of the game (his 650th in Green and White) to make it a five-point game, 105-100.
Tatum capped off a 9-0 run after a Tatum and-1 to make it 105-103.
Just like every run Boston went on, Indiana responded with its own run. Indiana’s Ben Sheppard hit a three and then a layup for a quick 7-0 to make it 112-103. Then a Turner dunk essentially put the game to bed pushing the lead back to 11.
Indiana went on a 13-0 go up 118-103 and the air essentially left Boston.
The Celtics will look to bounce back on New Year’s Eve when they take on the Toronto Raptors at 3 p.m.
