{"id":99931,"date":"2025-06-15T07:41:35","date_gmt":"2025-06-15T07:41:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/99931\/"},"modified":"2025-06-15T07:41:35","modified_gmt":"2025-06-15T07:41:35","slug":"in-grueling-nba-finals-pacers-may-regret-game-4-loss-to-thunder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/99931\/","title":{"rendered":"In grueling NBA Finals, Pacers may regret Game 4 loss to Thunder"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"play\"<\/p>\n

Shaq talks NBA Finals matchup and NBA on TNT<\/p>\n

Shaquille O’Neal joins Sports Seriously to talk about all things NBA and his upcoming Netflix docu-series ‘Power Moves’.<\/p>\n

Sports Seriously<\/p>\n

INDIANAPOLIS \u2013 The Indiana Pacers<\/a> needed Game 4.<\/p>\n

They had Game 4. At least it looked that way for three quarters. Felt like Indiana was headed for a 3-1 series lead against the Oklahoma City Thunder<\/a> in the NBA Finals. Felt like Indiana was in control.<\/p>\n

And they were. Until they were not.<\/p>\n

The Thunder, who trailed for much of the game and whose largest lead was the margin of the final score, defeated the Pacers 111-104 in Game 4<\/a> Friday, June 13.<\/p>\n

If the Pacers lose this series \u2013 it\u2019s 2-2 headed back to Oklahoma City for Game 5 \u2013 they will look at Game 4 as the one that made the difference, the one that altered the direction of the series.<\/p>\n

\u201cHey, you’re up seven at home,\u201d Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said of an 87-80 lead to start the fourth quarter, \u201cyou have to dig in and find a way, and we were unable to do it tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Was it a blown opportunity? That\u2019s unfair to the Thunder who had a lot to do with how Indiana played in the final six minutes. Was it one the Pacers squandered? Was it one the Thunder took? Either way, victory slipped away from Indiana. But that\u2019s NBA Finals basketball between two really good teams that play extremely hard and are well-coached. It\u2019s a series where every possession has meaning, and possessions are grueling.<\/p>\n

Just listen to the coaches.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s the ultimate effort, endeavor, whatever you want to call it,\u201d Carlisle said. \u201cI mean, it’s long. It’s arduous. But it’s the greatest opportunity going. It’s really hard, and it’s supposed to be hard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thunder coach Mark Daigneault: \u201cWe had some deflating plays. It was an easy game to give up on. \u2026 \u00a0They’re a hard team to beat here. They’re a hard team to beat, period. I thought we gutted it out on a night when we didn\u2019t have a lot going, especially offensively.\u201d<\/p>\n

Arduous. Gutted it out. This is an exhausting series, mentally and physically for players and coaches.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s frustrating, of course,\u201d Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton said. \u201cYou want to win that game, especially a game at home where you have the lead late. But that’s just not how the cookie crumbled today.”<\/p>\n

It has turned into a fantastic series, one that is going at least six games, and a Game 7 won\u2019t be surprising. The Game 5 winner will have a chance to win the title in Game 6 in Indianapolis and that atmosphere the fans create at Gainbridge Fieldhouse will be electric.<\/p>\n

Coaches and players talk about how this series is won in the margins. Who dove for a loose ball and saved a possession? Who took a charge or set a solid screen?<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a lot of guys make winning plays that can kind of be invisible to the untrained eye,\u201d Thunder center-forward Chet Holmgren said. \u201cIt’s not showing up necessarily in the stat sheet. It’s not like a highlight that’s going to be played over and over. It’s not one single instance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Oklahoma City took five more free throws and made nine more. \u201cThey missed four. We missed eight,\u201d Carlisle said. \u201cThe difference of four is significant. There’s a lot of little things going on.”<\/p>\n

The Thunder outrebounded the Pacers 43-33 and turned 12 offensive rebounds into 23 second-chance points.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis series is going to come down to the basics, and our inability to effectively rebound when we needed to is the biggest thing \u2013 a bunch of second-chance points made it difficult, and in the end, impossible,\u201d Carlisle said.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a best-of-three series now with Oklahoma City regaining home-court advantage, and the Pacers must win another on the road to win the title against a team that has lost at home eight times all season.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s going to be a challenge,\u201d Haliburton said, \u201cbut this group has been resilient all year.”<\/p>\n

In a Finals as close as this one, there\u2019s no time to sulk and let disappointment spill into the next game.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is where we’re going to have to dig in and circle the wagons and come back stronger on Monday,\u201d Carlisle said. \u201cThis is a big disappointment, but there’s three games left. \u2026 This kind of a challenge is going to have extreme highs and extreme lows. This is a low right now, and we’re going to have to bounce back from it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shaq talks NBA Finals matchup and NBA on TNT Shaquille O’Neal joins Sports Seriously to talk about all…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":99932,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3774],"tags":[7,1713,618,366,311,60,1501,257,619,97,113,126,3866,2624,70,85,6,1220,11,62,67,310,179,2294,2295,61,81,114,34,1712,1714,66,83,312,256,278],"class_list":{"0":"post-99931","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-indiana-pacers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-carlisle","10":"tag-chet","11":"tag-chet-holmgren","12":"tag-city","13":"tag-content","14":"tag-finals","15":"tag-haliburton","16":"tag-holmgren","17":"tag-in","18":"tag-indiana","19":"tag-indiana-pacers","20":"tag-indianapacers","21":"tag-indianapolis","22":"tag-national","23":"tag-national-sports","24":"tag-nba","25":"tag-nba-finals","26":"tag-nba-playoffs","27":"tag-neutral","28":"tag-news","29":"tag-oklahoma","30":"tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","31":"tag-opinion","32":"tag-opinion-content","33":"tag-overall","34":"tag-overall-neutral","35":"tag-pacers","36":"tag-playoffs","37":"tag-rick","38":"tag-rick-carlisle","39":"tag-sports","40":"tag-sports-news","41":"tag-thunder","42":"tag-tyrese","43":"tag-tyrese-haliburton"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/114686255689196599","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99931"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99931\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}