Thunder's One-Two Punch Knocks Out Pacers in Game Five
Jalen Williams scored a playoff career-high 40 points, and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander added 31 points to lead the Oklahoma City Thunder to a 120-109 win versus the Indiana Pacers in game five of the NBA Finals. The Thunder seized a 3-2 advantage, and put the Pacers behind in a series for the first time in the 2025 playoffs. Williams is the third youngest player with three straight 25 point games in the NBA Finals since the 1976 ABA-NBA merger; the only two younger players to accomplish that feat in that time period are Shaquille O'Neal and Kevin Durant. The 24 year old Williams is also the fifth youngest player to score at least 40 points in an NBA Finals game, trailing only Magic Johnson (20 years old in the 1980 NBA Finals), Rick Barry (three times in 1967 as a 23 year old), Russell Westbrook (23 years old in 2012), and Jerry West (23 years old in 1962).
The Thunder's one-two punch is usually Gilgeous-Alexander followed by Williams, but in this game reversing the order proved to be very effective. Williams shot 14-25 from the field while also contributing six rebounds, four assists, and one steal in 35 minutes. He had just one turnover. Gilgeous-Alexander shot 9-21 from the field, dished for a game-high 10 assists, logged a game-high four blocked shots, and swiped two steals in 38 minutes. Gilgeous-Alexander has produced 12 games this postseason with at least 30 points and at least 10 assists, breaking the record of 11 formerly held by Michael Jordan and LeBron James. Gilgeous-Alexander had three turnovers, which is an acceptable number given his high usage as a scorer/playmaker. Williams and Gilgeous-Alexander attacked the paint, and that enabled them to repeatedly draw fouls: Williams shot 9-12 from the free throw line, while Gilgeous-Alexander connected on 13 of his 14 free throw attempts.
Aaron Wiggins (14 points, five rebounds in 22 minutes off of the bench) and Cason Wallace (11 points, four steals in 17 minutes off of the bench) were the only other Thunder players who scored in double figures, but when the top two players combine for 71 points not much other offensive support is needed. Chet Holmgren scored nine points, grabbed a game-high 11 rebounds, and blocked three shots, so he made a positive impact despite shooting just 4-15 from the field. Lu Dort added nine points, eight rebounds, three assists, and two steals, while Alex Caruso scored just two points on 1-8 field goal shooting but was a defensive menace with four steals and one blocked shot.
Pascal Siakam led the Pacers with 28 points on 9-15 field goal shooting while also snaring six rebounds, dishing for five assists, poaching three steals, and blocking two shots, but he had six of the Pacers' 23 turnovers. T.J. McConnell scored 18 points on 8-14 field goal shooting in 22 minutes off of the bench while also accumulating four rebounds, four assists, and two steals. He had the Pacers' second best plus/minus number (+4), and he had 13 third quarter points as the Pacers outscored the Thunder 34-28 in that stanza to trim the Thunder's 59-45 halftime lead to 87-79. Bennedict Mathurin scored seven points and had a team-high eight rebounds, and he posted the team's best plus/minus number (+6) despite shooting just 2-11 from the field. Tyrese Haliburton, who has repeatedly saved the Pacers with big shots in clutch moments, had a scoreless first half on 0-5 field goal shooting before finishing with four points on 0-6 field goal shooting, seven rebounds, and a team-high six assists in 34 minutes. He was limited by a right calf injury but--as Pacers' Coach Rick Carlisle correctly noted during his postgame remarks--many players are limited by injuries at this stage of the season.
The Thunder scored 32 points off of Indiana's turnovers while conceding just nine points from their 11 turnovers, and those extra possessions enabled the Thunder to prevail despite shooting just 40-94 (.426) from the field while also losing the rebounding battle, 50-45. The Pacers led the Thunder in points in the paint (48-42) and second chance points (21-17), but the combination of the Thunder's relentless defensive pressure with the dynamic scoring/playmaking of Williams and Gilgeous-Alexander decided the outcome.
The Thunder led for the final 44:52 of the game, and built the margin to 18 (56-38) at the 2:29 mark of the second quarter. McConnell's fantastic third quarter helped the Pacers to chip away, and the Pacers pulled to within two points (95-93) after Siakam hit a three pointer at the 8:30 mark of the fourth quarter. The Thunder then went on an 18-4 run to seal the game and, most likely, the series; during that crucial stretch, Williams scored eight points and Gilgeous-Alexander scored five points.
Oklahoma City probably would have already won the series if Thunder Coach Mark Daigenault had not blundered by changing his starting lineup prior to game one, inserting Cason Wallace in place of Isaiah Hartenstein; the Thunder lost that game and trailed 2-1 before Daigneault went back to the starting lineup that posted a 45-8 regular season record and a 12-4 record in the playoffs. The Thunder won game four after putting Hartenstein back in the starting lineup and are now 2-0 in this series with the starting lineup that carried them to most of their wins in the regular season and the playoffs. Hartenstein's game five numbers--four points, eight rebounds, four assists--are not gaudy, but the goal is to win games, not to be "analytically correct." With Hartenstein in the starting lineup, all of the Thunder's players are in their natural and accustomed roles, which enabled the Thunder to not only build a 29-17 first quarter lead but to also withstand the inevitable Indiana comeback.
Just at it would be wrong to evaluate the Thunder's starting lineup change based solely on the numbers posted by Hartenstein or Wallace outside of the larger context of the team's overall play, it would also be wrong to assert that Carlisle erred by not giving McConnell more minutes at Haliburton's expense in game five. McConnell is a bench player who performs best against bench players while his minutes are maintained within a certain range. Call it the "Trevor Ariza effect." Carlisle explained after game five that he managed McConnell's late game minutes based on McConnell being fatigued and making some errors that seemed to be a result of that fatigue. A "stat guru" might argue that because McConnell scored 18 points in 22 minutes he would have scored 36 points in 44 minutes, but that is not how NBA basketball works; if McConnell had played 22 more minutes it is much more likely that his turnovers and missed field goals would have increased than that his point total would have doubled.
"Stat gurus" focus too much on per minute and per possession statistics without understanding or acknowledging other factors, and that faulty, limited way of conceptualizing the game leads "stat gurus" to make flawed assertions, such as declaring that Manu Ginobili was just as good as Kobe Bryant, which is demonstrably false for a variety of reasons, including the difference between being a player who logs heavy minutes as the number one option versus being a player who logs limited minutes while often playing against bench players. Understanding that difference is one reason that I correctly predicted that James Harden would not lead a team to the NBA Finals as a number one option even though he was efficient as the third option for the Kevin Durant-Russell Westbrook Thunder team that reached the 2012 NBA Finals.
Talking about "adjustments" and substitution patterns is one way that commentators attempt to sound well-informed even when they lack foundational knowledge about the NBA game. The reality is that the best "adjustment" is playing harder. Coaches usually have good reasons for their substitution patterns, based on their observations of their players in practices and in games. The Hartenstein-Wallace change is an unusual example of a coach outsmarting himself--probably based on some "stat guru" feeding him nonsense about the supposed advantages of using a small lineup against Indiana--and it is fortunate for the Thunder that Daigenault was not too stubborn to reverse course before the Thunder fell into a 3-1 hole.
Labels: Indiana Pacers, Isaiah Hartenstein, Jalen Williams, Oklahoma City Thunder, Pascal Siakam, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Tyrese Haliburton
posted by David Friedman @ 2:02 PM
7 Comments:
"Analytically correct" is an inspired turn of phrase! Good stuff David! But yeah, these analytics guys lose sight of the humanity of the players amidst all those numbers. The phrase "just another statistic" usually has depressing socioeconomic connotations but we might apply similar connotations to sports and analytics.
This might be far afield, but I recently watched Roger Federer's commencement address at Dartmouth from last year, on YouTube. Federer cited the very interesting statistic that for his career, he only won 54% of his points. Similar stats for Nadal and Djokovic et al. Was he only 4% better than the competition he faced over a 20-year career? The question is absurd, but so is the like notion, as you say, that Manu Ginobili was better than Kobe Bryant per similar number-crunching.
With Fed, of course, it's the timing of his won-points from match to match that counted. Just a couple of weeks ago in the French Open final, Skinner won one more point than Alcaraz (193 to 192 I think), but obviously Alcaraz's points won were fewer but, in the end, decisive. I'm especially thinking of the three match points that he saved in the third set I think.
Sorry about this tennis tangent, but your article, and your remarks generally about analytics, made me think of Federer's speech.
Oh, and thanks again for "analytically correct"!
One of my favorite quotes from an NBA coach is when Lionel Hollins expressed his displeasure with the Grizzlies trading Rudy Gay:
”When you have champagne taste, you can’t be on a beer budget. It’s a small market and I understand the economics of being in a small mark. I’ve been with the Grizzlies for 11 years in Memphis. Rudy Gay has been a big part of our success. I’ve known him as a kid as a rookie coming in. He’s a big part of my success as a coach here and I feel I was a big part of his success and I wish him the best as he moves forward into the second chapter of his career.”
He also had this gem about teams that have an absurd preoccupation with analytics:
"We get hung up on statistics a little too much, and I think that's a bad trait all over the league that's taken place. And the media has done it because it's easy to go to the stats to make a point or to build up a player or tear down a player. Just the analyzing, I see it every time listening to talk show radio. You've got guys spouting off stat after stat after stat. The bottom line is going out and contributing to your team for winning."
There isn’t anything wrong with teams using analytics in its self. Every team uses analytics to various degrees but the problem is when entire rosters and team identities are constructed with an absurdly high reliance on analytics to the point where they view players as chess pieces instead of actual humans. That is not a shot at chess, I wouldn’t dare on your blog, but just to show that an analytics-heavy approach doesn’t adequately consider the human intangibles of athletes.
Hartenstein not starting was bizarre and not ideal, but it's not why OKC lost the 2 games that they did lose, especially game 1. Who started or did not start in game 1 had no bearing with OKC tanking the last few minutes of the game. But like you said, OKC just needed to play harder and that's why they're up 3-2 now. X's and O's matter some, but they rarely ultimately dictate outcomes of series.
Advanced stats sometimes are overblown but they do matter some to pay attention to. Maybe Deignault outsmarted himself, but maybe not. He had his team in position to win each game. Curious though, how do you know stat gurus influenced him bringing Hartenstein off the bench? And why didn't he do it before the Finals? OKC was also down 2-1 with Hartenstein starting vs Denver.
The bottomline is that OKC is much better than Indiana, but sometimes the better team needs to figure things out. It's much too simplistic to just blame OKC losing even 1 game just because Hartenstein didn't start especially when they were dominating for most of game 1. Wallace also started 43 of the 68 regular season games he played. So him in the starting lineup in the playoffs isn't bizarre at all and wouldn't be a surprise for his teammates. He was also 5th on the team in mpg.
Anonymous:
Thank you!
When he was a CBS commentator, Bill Russell said that how many points a player scores does not matter as much as when he scores those points. He was specifically referring to Julius Erving's ability to score crucial baskets to help his team win; this is similar to your note about Federer winning the key points in so many of his matches.
Anonymous:
As I pointed out in my game recaps, the Thunder's record when Hartenstein started was 45-8 during the regular season and 12-4 during the playoffs prior to the Finals. The Thunder went 1-2 not starting Hartenstein in the Finals, and are now 2-0 with him starting. I have already explained why changing the starting lineup is disruptive and counterproductive for the superior team in general, and for the Thunder in particular. I can't prove that not starting Hartenstein is why the Thunder started the series 1-2, but I have insisted throughout the series that this move was a mistake and there is no evidence refuting my assertion.
It is true that Wallace started some games, but when the Thunder were at full strength their preferred starting lineup included Hartenstein, and that starting lineup won at a very high rate, as noted above.
Michael:
I remember those comments by Hollins, who was feuding with "stat guru"/team executive John Hollinger. The Grizzlies' record during Hollinger's tenure speaks for itself; he inherited a very good team, and did nothing to improve the squad.
a bit of a non-sequitur, but I tend to agree with Bron's position at least on a theoretical level (https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/45538297/lebron-james-bemoans-ring-culture-nba-never-enough), without necessarily specifically applying this in any way to his individual career
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