Game Day: Pacers (24-18) @ Suns (23-18), Sun 1/21/24

[Flagrant Fowl]

How about Beal in crunch time? He was nice.

We won because we went to Beal instead of Book to initiate the offense. Really nice to have that option as Book didn’t have it

It wasn't about who initiated from the Suns side, they were hunting Hield the whole time even when the Pacers tried to hide him on Allen.

Well that’s true, but to attack Hield they went to Beal… it was Beal trying to get Hield onto him that freed up Allen.

Because the Pacers were putting Hield on Beal on prior possessions. I'm sure the Suns would've rather had Booker initiate the hunt if they knew the Pacers were going to put Siakam on Beal.

I don't think the initiator was a tactical scheme based on Booker or Beal's ability.

[Split T]

How about Beal in crunch time? He was nice.

We won because we went to Beal instead of Book to initiate the offense. Really nice to have that option as Book didn’t have it

It wasn't about who initiated from the Suns side, they were hunting Hield the whole time even when the Pacers tried to hide him on Allen.

Well that’s true, but to attack Hield they went to Beal… it was Beal trying to get Hield onto him that freed up Allen.

Because the Pacers were putting Hield on Beal on prior possessions. I'm sure the Suns would've rather had Booker initiate the hunt if they knew the Pacers were going to put Siakam on Beal.

I don't think the initiator was a tactical scheme based on Booker or Beal's ability.

You may be right, but they did stick with Beal after they put Siakam on him.

[Vladimir_Taltos]

Wow does our bench play need improved...we can't continue like this all season...our bench was scorched by the Pacers, 55:9...ouch. If Haliburton had been on the court, this would have been far from a certainty. When is Bol coming back?

[Split T]

Holding what has been the best offense in the history of the game to an offensive rating worse than everyone that’s not San Antonio, Portland, Memphis, and Charlotte this year seems good. Of course they didn’t have Haliburton…

[Split T]

Also the suns small ball lineup is up to 19 minutes and has a 151.2 offensive rating and a 100.0 defensive rating. We close both halves with it tonight(fared better in the 2nd half). Want to see it more.

[Flagrant Fowl]

That lineup with a long athletic 4 who can't be ignored from 3 would be a nightmare to defend. Or Eric Gordon could play better more often.

[Split T]

That lineup with a long athletic 4 who can't be ignored from 3 would be a nightmare to defend. Or Eric Gordon could play better more often.

I agree…that’s the player we are missing the most…

[Wally_West]

[Nodack]

I was getting pissed early that Jalen Smith was dominating the Suns in the first quarter. He definitely had a chip on his shoulder. After his third 3 and they went to a time out and you could see him talking some serious smack to someone on his way back to the bench. I was thinking, do you really want to start talking smack this early? KD went right at him ext possession and took him to the hole. I didn’t hear as much from Smith the rest of the way. I forgot about Jalen. Has he been playing well or did he just really want to take it to the Suns?

[SunsSince92]

9 bench points.

Yep. It was great to get another win tonight against a good team but the bench production is shocking. The big 3 scored 92 points between them tonight while the bench contributed 9 as you say.

As optimistic as we can be about this team starting to figure things out, it just feels like we're treading on eggshells hoping that one of the big 3 / Allen don't go down again as we have zero depth. Perhaps Bol Bol can be a solid contributor when he returns but that's banking a lot on a guy who couldn't even crack the rotation early on in the season. As Gordon proved again tonight, when he's off, he's unplayable.

I don't want to sound overly pessimistic but I can't help but feel the big games from the big 3 lately are just papering over some of the cracks.

[Superbone]

I was getting pissed early that Jalen Smith was dominating the Suns in the first quarter. He definitely had a chip on his shoulder. After his third 3 and they went to a time out and you could see him talking some serious smack to someone on his way back to the bench. I was thinking, do you really want to start talking smack this early? KD went right at him ext possession and took him to the hole. I didn’t hear as much from Smith the rest of the way. I forgot about Jalen. Has he been playing well or did he just really want to take it to the Suns?

My understanding is that Smith took large strides in his three point shooting this year and is hitting at a very good rate.

[Nodack]

Gordon is 1/11 on 3s in the last couple of games. He is due. He and Booker were cold in the fourth. Durant was on fire.

[Superbone]

Gordon is 1/11 on 3s in the last couple of games. He is due. He and Booker were cold in the fourth. Durant was on fire.

And Beal finished them with a little help from Allen.

[Superbone]

[ShelC]

Postgame Quotes and Videos

Spoiler: show/hide

full game replay https://fishker.com/1363-2/

[specialsauce]

9 bench points.

Yep. It was great to get another win tonight against a good team but the bench production is shocking. The big 3 scored 92 points between them tonight while the bench contributed 9 as you say.

As optimistic as we can be about this team starting to figure things out, it just feels like we're treading on eggshells hoping that one of the big 3 / Allen don't go down again as we have zero depth. Perhaps Bol Bol can be a solid contributor when he returns but that's banking a lot on a guy who couldn't even crack the rotation early on in the season. As Gordon proved again tonight, when he's off, he's unplayable.

I don't want to sound overly pessimistic but I can't help but feel the big games from the big 3 lately are just papering over some of the cracks.

We better add 2 guys before the playoffs that are rotation worthy. I’m really worried about our bench. I don’t trust a single one of them

[In2ition]

I was getting pissed early that Jalen Smith was dominating the Suns in the first quarter. He definitely had a chip on his shoulder. After his third 3 and they went to a time out and you could see him talking some serious smack to someone on his way back to the bench. I was thinking, do you really want to start talking smack this early? KD went right at him ext possession and took him to the hole. I didn’t hear as much from Smith the rest of the way. I forgot about Jalen. Has he been playing well or did he just really want to take it to the Suns?

To further this point, he went at KD first and KD denied him with great defense, then KD came down and scored Jalen. The Jalen Smith revenge tour was over at that point.

[Split T]

We also figured out to not leave Stix open. His 3 3s were all pick n pops where his defender was helping on the ball. They were wide open and he knocked them down. We didn’t leave him anymore…he never even took another shot.

[Nodack]

And they won five in a row.

[Mori Chu]

Just looking back at the stats from this win. KD's 40 points on 18-25 shooting obviously stands out, as does the 40-26-25 points from the Big 3. Grayson Allen had a nicely efficient game with 13 points on 5-7 shooting, including 3-4 from 3. Nurk struggled a bit scoring only 4, but he had 13 rebounds before fouling out.

The lack of bench production has to be a bit concerning. We scored only 9 points total from our bench (4 from Gordon, 3 from Eubanks, and 2 from Metu). I hope the coaching staff can work on this and try to get the bench involved more. Last night we once again played KBD and he gave us essentially nothing; 0 points, 2 rebounds, 1 assist in 12 minutes. I think I'd prefer to see Little take those minutes; why did he get a DNP? Still recovering? Eric Gordon shot 1-6 including 0-5 from 3; not good enough. I know some folks here have been ragging on EG saying he's a net negative, and I've been more positive on him, but he certainly has had some real stinkers in terms of FG% lately.

I wonder if part of the low bench production is because we don't have a real facilitator out there with the bench lineup, so it kind of devolves into 1-on-1 play? This could be an argument for giving some minutes to Saben Lee and/or Goodwin. I just hope it's something they are working on.

https://www.espn.com/nba/boxscore/_/gameId/401585232