Pacers will regret not fouling Celtics’ Jaylen Brown, but the mistake was made before he ever caught the ball

One play doesn’t decide a game, or so every coach on the planet will tell you, but we just cannot talk about anything in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals until we talk about the Pacers not fouling the Celtics with a 3-point lead and less than 10 seconds to play. Instead, Indiana allowed Jaylen Brown to catch in the corner and raise up for the tying 3. 

Take a look:

Now, both Rick Carlisle and Tyrese Haliburton said the intent was to foul on the play. But with the way Brown caught the pass already faced up to the basket with the threat of pulling the trigger immediately, Pascal Siakam made the quick decision to not risk fouling on a 3-point attempt. 

“Yes [there was intruction to foul],” Carlisle said. “But [Brown] caught the ball and was faced up, so Pascal decided to lay off, which was… I understand. That’s probably the right decision, you don’t want to give up a four-point play. Look, a lot of things had to go wrong for us and right for them. They did. We have to own it.”

That is all true. If the Pacers don’t turn the ball over on the preceding inbound pass, the game is probably over before Brown ever has a chance to make this shot. And yes, once Brown caught the ball in the faced-up position, Siakam, trailing the play, would’ve been playing with fire reaching in for a quick hack. 

In fact, Siakam executed a terrific close out to pin Brown in the coffin corner, nearly behind the backboard, considering his lag time, and he was careful to clear his feet of Brown’s landing space. He could’ve gotten a hand up on the actual shot, but at that point he was decidedly, and correctly, in don’t-foul mode, and he simply forced Brown to make a supremely tough shot. Siakam made the correct call in that position. 

The mistake was allowing Brown to catch the ball in that faced-up position in the first place, which was only possible because Siakam was trailing behind off the misdirection screen action that Boston ran. 

Indiana’s entire defensive alignment and subsequent execution should’ve been devoted to nothing except guarding…

Source link : https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/pacers-will-regret-not-fouling-celtics-jaylen-brown-but-the-mistake-was-made-before-he-ever-caught-the-ball/

Author : Brad Botkin

Publish date : 2024-05-22 06:17:42

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