Pacers blowout loss vs Celtics only makes Pascal Siakam All-Star case more clear

MY OFFICE, Ind. – An 18-18 start for the Pacers against the Celtics on Wednesday night felt promising after they blew it against the Philadelphia 76ers two days prior. Pascal Siakam was scoring and some defensive intensity was clear for the first 8.5 minutes of action.

Forty seconds prior to the Pacers knotting the score at 18, both Siakam and Andrew Nembhard exited the game. The lineup at the time featured T.J. McConnell, Ben Sheppard, Aaron Nesmith, Jarace Walker, and Isaiah Jackson. Not a strong offensive group, but that approximate combination of players has defended well enough before for it to not matter much.

On this night, they did neither. Siakam and Tony Bradley would enter the game 2:22 after the score was tied. Now, though, the Pacers were down by nine. Boston ended the first quarter on a 12-2 run.

The Pacers kept Siakam on the floor longer than normal during his second of three stints in the first half. He exited the game in the second quarter with 6:18 on the floor, and the Pacers had trimmed their deficit to eight 32 seconds prior. With 4:16 on the clock, a mere two minutes had passed. The Celtics were up by 20.

Circle City Spin

The Indiana Pacers and Indiana Fever, up close

Circle City SpinTony East

That Boston run would, in total, reach 15-0. At halftime, the hosts were up by 20. To that point, Siakam had 16 points, eight rebounds, and three assists on 6/12 shooting. Indiana lost his 19:24 of action by just one point.

The rest of the team was 12/35 from the field. And the Pacers lost the 4:36 that Siakam sat by 19 points. They have trouble scoring without him, but in this instance, they couldn't do much of anything when their star sat.

"A lot of it comes down to us turning the ball over again," Pacers assistant coach Lloyd Pierce said of the team's struggles during a halftime interview on the FanDuel Sports Indiana broadcast of the game. "And then defending without fouling... We've got to keep them out of the paint."

The second half featured a different script in that the Pacers played better, but the same script in that Siakam was awesome and the rest of the team was there for support. The All-Star candidate had 16 points on 6/9 shooting in the second half with two more rebounds and an assist. The Pacers won his minutes and were -2 without him on the floor until garbage time arrived and the blue and gold made a small final push.

Siakam finished the outing with 32 points, 10 rebounds, and four assists. That's a gaudy stat line, and Basketball Reference's game score metric calls it his seventh-best game this year. The Pacers were -1 in his 32:43 and -14 in the 15:17 without him. They nearly bled a point per minute with the star forward on the bench yet played the second best team in the East to essentially an even draw when he was on the floor.

"The shots we can't control. The movement we can," Pierce said at halftime. "We gotta generate the right shots."

I found that telling. Player movement was important for the Pacers in this game due to the defensive attention Siakam was receiving. Well-time cuts and spacing principles were vital.

But they weren't there. Look at this defense from Boston, hat tip to Caitlin Cooper.

Siakam was fouled on this play, but all of Walker, Aaron Nesmith, and Sheppard are wide open. Andrew Nembhard has yet to enter the frame, which didn't help for spacing, but the Celtics do not care about other Pacers threats. They wanted to slow down Siakam.

Despite that defensive effort, they weren't able to. Siakam posted his fifth 30-point double double this season and provided capable defense. He was fantastic. But even with more spacing provided by Siakam's gravity, the rest of the Pacers did little.

Jay Huff, Nesmith, and Nembhard combined to shoot 0/12 from deep. Outside of Siakam, Walker and Sheppard attempted the most threes for the Pacers in this game. Those two went 5/15 from long range. In total, the blue and gold were 25/73 (34%) on non-Siakam shots.

Walker had a clean outing with 19 points. Johnny Furphy added 10. That's the full list of Pacers in double figures in their loss to the Celtics. The game flow and the stats lay out the story perfectly: Pascal Siakam didn't get enough help.

For the season, the Pacers have a -4.59 net rating with Siakam on the floor. That's, obviously, below average and not a good number. When he's off the floor, though? That net rating drops to -15.79. That's a +12.2 net rating swing, bigger than that of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (I loathe comparing on/off numbers from two different teams but did it for effect here).

It was a 15-point loss in which the Pacers did not play particularly well. Most blowouts don't help a player's All-Star case. This one did as Siakam showed how great and important he is, even against tight coverages.

Jarace Walker, good again

This has been written and will be written, but Walker is playing solid basketball right now. He had 19 points, three rebounds, two assists, and two steals in Boston. Perhaps just as important: Walker didn't turn the ball over once.

It was his third-highest scoring game of the season, which will always stand out. But it felt more like a continuing trend than, say, his 20-point night in Dallas back in November, which felt more like a flash in the pan at the time.

Since Christmas (15 games), the third-year forward is averaging 9.7 points, 3.3 rebounds, and 1.9 assists per game. In that stretch, Walker is shooting 47.3% from the field and 51.8% from deep. That is, obviously, an unsustainable number from beyond the arc. But his early-season slump was unsustainably bad, too.

45 games can be easily broken into thirds. Here's Walker shooting splits in each 15-game stretch of the season (two-point percentage, three-point percentage, overall field goal percentage):

1. Games 1-15: 32.1%, 28.9%, 30.6%
2. Games 16-30: 48.8%, 30.2%, 37.7%
3. Games 31-45: 42.6%, 51.8%, 47.3%

While the three-point percentage will drop, Walker was better inside the arc in the middle 15 games. And he's steadily improved his efficiency throughout the season. That's big for the Pacers, and Walker is at nearly 36% from deep this year now.

Siakam's numbers

I've done this a few times, but here's the latest update. Pascal Siakam is averaging 23.8 points, 7.0 rebounds, and 4.0 assists per game. Rounding those numbers down to the nearest half point is 23.5 points, 7.0 rebounds, and 4.0 assists. Here is every NBA player averaging those numbers this season.

1. Pascal Siakam
2. Nikola Jokic
3. Luka Doncic
4. Giannis Antetokounmpo
5. Deni Avdija

Just on production, Siakam is close to a no-doubt All-Star, especially in a weak Eastern Conference. But one number will hurt Siakam a great deal: 10-35. That's the Pacers record. His All-Star fate will be decided soon.

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