(it's long, but it's the story of how that season finished and I think you will enjoy it, especially the under 30 crowd)
That season is famous for being the first playoff series win and the first run to the ECF. The coming out party for Reggie and the "Hicks" in general.
Lost in the haze of memories is the perspective of where that team was when it hadn't yet made that run, but was on the cusp of it. The first, most obvious memory is Larry Brown in his first season, taking over for a coach that was viewed as under performing with the talent he had. Bob Hill had pulled the Isiah, he'd made the first round which had let him linger due to low expectations. But as time wore on management and fans began to suspect that there was more wins on that roster than he was bringing out of them.
Now know one thought Vogel was taking last year's team to a +500 finish and the playoffs, and it was unclear just what roster changes the team would be able to make to push to the level of this season. But down the line I don't think there were more than 2 (BillS and Buck) that didn't think that JOB was not getting the most out of the roster.
Vogel of course was a mid-season change and has now had to go into year 2 with a crazy mini-season whereas Brown started properly in a normal summer. But the similarities are there.
But Brown's first year wasn't just a gravy train. The team traded their current AS and 2 time defending 6th man of the year winner for a little known defensive specialist, and Reggie hadn't really pulled off any big time playoff magic (the Rifleman held that role up till then).
Near the end of the season the team was a respectable .527 at 39-35, but wasn't dramatically better than the 41-41 teams of Hill.
The standings as of April 10th games, 1994
East
Knicks 52-22*
Magic 45-29**
Nets 40-35*
Heat 40-35**
Celtics 28-46
Sixers 23-52
Bullets 22-53
*(the Knicks had just beaten the Nets, the Magic had just beaten the Heat)
Central
Hawks 52-23
Bulls 51-24
Cavs 42-33
Pacers 39-35 (8th seed)
Hornets 35-39
Pistons 20-54
Bucks 19-55
It seemed certain that the Cavs would hold them off and that maybe the Nets and Heat would as well, potentially pitting them against ATL or NYK in round 1 for another "Bob Hill" like first round exit as an 8th seed.
But the Pacers schedule was moderately favorable:
BOS, who wasn't very good at this point
Then you had 4 road games, but against dreadful teams.
@PHI
@MIN (20-54 as of April 10th, and would not win another game all year)
@DET
@WSH
Then home for 2 games, one being a team trying to hang in there (ahem, like PHI this year) and the other against the terrible PHI team again
CLE
PHI
Note that CLE is the best in this group, the others are really weak teams, and despite the road games the only back to back game was that home gave vs CLE (following @WSH).
The final game of the 8 to end the year was a good team, the Miami Heat. But it was at home and by then Miami might not even need to win or lose.
This was the epitome of an easy stretch of the schedule and the Pacers promptly jumped all over it. The ran off a string of big wins, by 13 over BOS, 28 over PHI, 18 over MIN. Dogs getting beat like the weaker teams they were.
But then came two road games that were a bit tougher than you'd expect. Detroit had an 8 game losing streak coming into the game, and in fact they wouldn't win a game after game 69 on March 29th. But after 3 quarters the game was all tied up. The Pacers managed to pull out a 5 point squeaker win against a team in free fall.
The Pistons lost the next game to ORL by 28 and the one after that in MIL by 25. And in fact the Pacers had beat them in Indy a few weeks prior by 16 points. The Pacers had almost blown what should have been an easy win.
The next game versus Washington (think Cavs game the other night) the Pacers held a nice 18 point lead going into the 4th. The Bullets then dropped 37 points on the Pacers only to come up short by 1 point, 111-110. The Pacers had almost blown another easy win, but managed to salvage it.
Reggie went 14-21 for 37 points, Rik went 11-15 for 23 points with 6 assists and 4 blocks (which is in no way meant to remind you of Roy Hibbert )
So here they stood, plowing through the easy schedule with 5 straight wins despite 2 near misses.
They came back home for those final 3 games and promptely put up a few very impressive wins. First by extending a 5 point 3rd quarter lead to an 11 point win over CLE who they were now in a dogfight with for a better playoff spot (end of night had them both at 45 wins with 2 games to go for each team).
Then they utterly destroyed PHI by FORTY FIVE points (45). And they had that 45 point lead after 3 quarters. No Pacer played more than 30 minutes and no Pacer took more than 9 shots except for Smits, who went 17-24 for 40 freaking points, 11 boards, 3 assists, 2 steals and a block...in 27 minutes. It's not 8 in 8.9 seconds, but 40 points in 27 minutes is pretty darn impressive.
For the 82nd game vs Miami the Pacers were now sitting on 46 wins and were tied with the Cavs for the 5th seed. They'd blown past the Heat who had gone 2-4 since the 10th, they'd slipped past the Nets who had gone 5-1 in that same span. Normally going 5-1 with a 1 game lead is enough to hold off the other team. The Nets were at 45 wins but had lost the series with the Pacers 3-1 and could only hope for a token tie by that final game.
So to recap that, the Pacers had used a 7-0 run with a win over the Cavs specifically to set themselves up for a vault from 8th seed to 5th seed in a span of 2 weeks. Had they but lost that Cavs game then they would have lost out to the Cavs for #5 because they'd be one game behind and would have lost the series 3-2. Instead they went into that final night tied and with the tie-breaker.
The Pacers went out and beat the Heat soundly by 33 to secure the now infamous matchup against young Shaq's Magic team. A Byron Scott jumper later and they'd won their first playoff series and were moving on with a shot to upset the Hawks, which of course they did.
But had then not had an easy schedule, one remarkably similar to the one they now face, and not rattled off 8 straight wins including a critical win against a playoff seed rival, they might have faced a far different first round opponent and fate. The Nets lost 3-1 to the Knicks and the Cavs went down 3-0 to the Bulls.
Instead the Pacers got the sweep and the most rest while the Hawks had to go all 5 games vs the Heat before facing Indy. The impact perhaps was the game 1 loss to the Pacers that ultimately did the Hawks in.
I just wanted to point out how a team with no business being in game 7 of the ECF 2 weeks before the playoffs start can make the most of an easy schedule and some gutsy play to completely change their fate and shock the world.
This current team and that team aren't just the same due to new coaches or an easy ending schedule. They both live off of balance and 2 top guys that play the arc and the post. Sure you have Reggie, Rik, Dale and McKey, but the starting PG at that point is Workman (42% FG, 6.2 APG) and you are leaning on an FA addition vet SG (Scott, who sounds a lot like Barbosa in role at that point).
After Scott and Tony the bench goes to Lester Connor who got the 8th most minutes in that Cavs win. Tony > Lou, but Kenny Williams < Tyler. And George Hill > Sam Mitchell in both PT and impact.
Brown was barely using 10 man rotations and had no one deeper like DJones or Price impacting games.
11-12 Pacers really do have a precedent to finish strong and roll that right on into a serious playoff run. It's been famously done before right here in this city.
That season is famous for being the first playoff series win and the first run to the ECF. The coming out party for Reggie and the "Hicks" in general.
Lost in the haze of memories is the perspective of where that team was when it hadn't yet made that run, but was on the cusp of it. The first, most obvious memory is Larry Brown in his first season, taking over for a coach that was viewed as under performing with the talent he had. Bob Hill had pulled the Isiah, he'd made the first round which had let him linger due to low expectations. But as time wore on management and fans began to suspect that there was more wins on that roster than he was bringing out of them.
Now know one thought Vogel was taking last year's team to a +500 finish and the playoffs, and it was unclear just what roster changes the team would be able to make to push to the level of this season. But down the line I don't think there were more than 2 (BillS and Buck) that didn't think that JOB was not getting the most out of the roster.
Vogel of course was a mid-season change and has now had to go into year 2 with a crazy mini-season whereas Brown started properly in a normal summer. But the similarities are there.
But Brown's first year wasn't just a gravy train. The team traded their current AS and 2 time defending 6th man of the year winner for a little known defensive specialist, and Reggie hadn't really pulled off any big time playoff magic (the Rifleman held that role up till then).
Near the end of the season the team was a respectable .527 at 39-35, but wasn't dramatically better than the 41-41 teams of Hill.
The standings as of April 10th games, 1994
East
Knicks 52-22*
Magic 45-29**
Nets 40-35*
Heat 40-35**
Celtics 28-46
Sixers 23-52
Bullets 22-53
*(the Knicks had just beaten the Nets, the Magic had just beaten the Heat)
Central
Hawks 52-23
Bulls 51-24
Cavs 42-33
Pacers 39-35 (8th seed)
Hornets 35-39
Pistons 20-54
Bucks 19-55
It seemed certain that the Cavs would hold them off and that maybe the Nets and Heat would as well, potentially pitting them against ATL or NYK in round 1 for another "Bob Hill" like first round exit as an 8th seed.
But the Pacers schedule was moderately favorable:
BOS, who wasn't very good at this point
Then you had 4 road games, but against dreadful teams.
@PHI
@MIN (20-54 as of April 10th, and would not win another game all year)
@DET
@WSH
Then home for 2 games, one being a team trying to hang in there (ahem, like PHI this year) and the other against the terrible PHI team again
CLE
PHI
Note that CLE is the best in this group, the others are really weak teams, and despite the road games the only back to back game was that home gave vs CLE (following @WSH).
The final game of the 8 to end the year was a good team, the Miami Heat. But it was at home and by then Miami might not even need to win or lose.
This was the epitome of an easy stretch of the schedule and the Pacers promptly jumped all over it. The ran off a string of big wins, by 13 over BOS, 28 over PHI, 18 over MIN. Dogs getting beat like the weaker teams they were.
But then came two road games that were a bit tougher than you'd expect. Detroit had an 8 game losing streak coming into the game, and in fact they wouldn't win a game after game 69 on March 29th. But after 3 quarters the game was all tied up. The Pacers managed to pull out a 5 point squeaker win against a team in free fall.
The Pistons lost the next game to ORL by 28 and the one after that in MIL by 25. And in fact the Pacers had beat them in Indy a few weeks prior by 16 points. The Pacers had almost blown what should have been an easy win.
The next game versus Washington (think Cavs game the other night) the Pacers held a nice 18 point lead going into the 4th. The Bullets then dropped 37 points on the Pacers only to come up short by 1 point, 111-110. The Pacers had almost blown another easy win, but managed to salvage it.
Reggie went 14-21 for 37 points, Rik went 11-15 for 23 points with 6 assists and 4 blocks (which is in no way meant to remind you of Roy Hibbert )
So here they stood, plowing through the easy schedule with 5 straight wins despite 2 near misses.
They came back home for those final 3 games and promptely put up a few very impressive wins. First by extending a 5 point 3rd quarter lead to an 11 point win over CLE who they were now in a dogfight with for a better playoff spot (end of night had them both at 45 wins with 2 games to go for each team).
Then they utterly destroyed PHI by FORTY FIVE points (45). And they had that 45 point lead after 3 quarters. No Pacer played more than 30 minutes and no Pacer took more than 9 shots except for Smits, who went 17-24 for 40 freaking points, 11 boards, 3 assists, 2 steals and a block...in 27 minutes. It's not 8 in 8.9 seconds, but 40 points in 27 minutes is pretty darn impressive.
For the 82nd game vs Miami the Pacers were now sitting on 46 wins and were tied with the Cavs for the 5th seed. They'd blown past the Heat who had gone 2-4 since the 10th, they'd slipped past the Nets who had gone 5-1 in that same span. Normally going 5-1 with a 1 game lead is enough to hold off the other team. The Nets were at 45 wins but had lost the series with the Pacers 3-1 and could only hope for a token tie by that final game.
So to recap that, the Pacers had used a 7-0 run with a win over the Cavs specifically to set themselves up for a vault from 8th seed to 5th seed in a span of 2 weeks. Had they but lost that Cavs game then they would have lost out to the Cavs for #5 because they'd be one game behind and would have lost the series 3-2. Instead they went into that final night tied and with the tie-breaker.
The Pacers went out and beat the Heat soundly by 33 to secure the now infamous matchup against young Shaq's Magic team. A Byron Scott jumper later and they'd won their first playoff series and were moving on with a shot to upset the Hawks, which of course they did.
But had then not had an easy schedule, one remarkably similar to the one they now face, and not rattled off 8 straight wins including a critical win against a playoff seed rival, they might have faced a far different first round opponent and fate. The Nets lost 3-1 to the Knicks and the Cavs went down 3-0 to the Bulls.
Instead the Pacers got the sweep and the most rest while the Hawks had to go all 5 games vs the Heat before facing Indy. The impact perhaps was the game 1 loss to the Pacers that ultimately did the Hawks in.
I just wanted to point out how a team with no business being in game 7 of the ECF 2 weeks before the playoffs start can make the most of an easy schedule and some gutsy play to completely change their fate and shock the world.
This current team and that team aren't just the same due to new coaches or an easy ending schedule. They both live off of balance and 2 top guys that play the arc and the post. Sure you have Reggie, Rik, Dale and McKey, but the starting PG at that point is Workman (42% FG, 6.2 APG) and you are leaning on an FA addition vet SG (Scott, who sounds a lot like Barbosa in role at that point).
After Scott and Tony the bench goes to Lester Connor who got the 8th most minutes in that Cavs win. Tony > Lou, but Kenny Williams < Tyler. And George Hill > Sam Mitchell in both PT and impact.
Brown was barely using 10 man rotations and had no one deeper like DJones or Price impacting games.
11-12 Pacers really do have a precedent to finish strong and roll that right on into a serious playoff run. It's been famously done before right here in this city.
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