Moving on from Game 7 without letting go of Game 7

What follows is my response to a mailbag question in which I was asked by patron Matthew Hogg, "Why do we do this to ourselves?" in the wake of the nightmare fuel that was Game 7. Just this once, a blog that isn't (specifically) about the basketball played by the Indiana Pacers, but rather our relationship to the basketball played by the Indiana Pacers.

By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper

Toward the end of the 2023-24 season, I received a mailbag question that asked me to share my earliest memory of basketball. At the time, I honestly couldn't remember anything of special note, but my initial thoughts immediately went to the 11-year-old version of me who was creating shot-charts for myself to track on my driveway. (Yes, that's what type of kid I was. Let's just pretend like at least some of you are surprised by this.) As such, for a better, less embarrassing answer, I decided to pose the same question to my dad.

As some of you likely may remember, my dad coached high school boys basketball here in Indiana for over a decade, which is where a lot of my background and understanding of the game comes from. Wherever two or more coaches were gathered, I wanted to be there also -- soaking up as much knowledge as I could, while hopefully not also being a pest (i.e. will this preteen girl please stop asking what a box-and-one defense is, geez!). Anyway, despite our shared love of basketball, it is very rare that my dad shares anything with me about his experiences actually playing basketball. I have to hear that from family friends and relatives, if I hear about it all. Put simply, he is generally not a "back in my day" sort of dad. In response to this particular question, though, he decided to open up, sharing a story from back in the day, likely because it also allowed him to talk about his dad (my since-passed away grandpa), along with his favorite team: The Indiana Pacers.

As a kid, according to him, my dad was a huge fan of Roger Brown, and one of the best days of his childhood was when my grandpa took him to watch the ABA Pacers play at the Indiana State Fairgrounds Coliseum. Of course, as any kid would be, he was also very enamored with the red, white, and blue basketball -- especially when he found out that a gas station chain was giving away a free version of the ball with any purchase of a certain dollar amount of gas. Unfortunately, much to my dad's chagrin, the free version of the ball was, well, exactly what you would expect the free version of the ball to be. It was made of plastic; and thus, much to my grandpa's chagrin, my dad was still begging him for an actual, authentic version of the ball. Eventually, my grandpa relented and took him to a sporting goods store in Indy that sold the real deal in all its red, white, and blue glory.

The only problem was, my dad had a blacktop driveway at home, which meant the ball basically turned into the soot-disguised version of the puppies from the 101 Dalmatians during the scene when they're trying to hide from Cruella anytime he played outside with it. At school, he was allowed to go inside and shoot at the gym during recess, but only if the ball wasn't covered in dirt. He wasn't about to give up his chances to put up shots at home, so he cleaned that dang ball every dang day.

The things we do for love!

Over fifty years later, his love for the Pacers has outlasted the lifespan of that ball, although my mom and I did gift him another one for his birthday several years ago, long before either of us knew of this story. Again, he doesn't share much of himself, but he did share his love of the Pacers with me.

When I was growing up, we mourned the aftermath of Malice at the Palace together (Jermaine O'Neal was to me what Roger Brown was to my dad). Since I started doing whatever you call what I do, way back during the summer of 2013 (long live Indy Cornrows), I've watched Paul George snap his leg in half during a Team USA scrimmage. I cringed when Victor Oladipo's knee came apart, and yes, my heart dropped as Tyrese Haliburton dropped to the floor, pounding his fist, in both physical and mental anguish.

All of those things sucked immensely hard, especially for the players, who are first and foremost people, going through them. After all, surgery and prognoses aren't just words written in press releases. Just because it says "successful," as it almost always does, doesn't mean that every day on the journey back to becoming a world-class athlete is going to be deemed a success without any hardship. And wow, has there has been a lot of hardship. Someday, as I noted recently on social media, it's my greatest hope for both the franchise and the fanbase, that an era for the Pacers will just end with a normal, non-devastating loss.

Prior to the Eastern Conference Finals, when I was a guest on the Basketball Illuminati podcast with Tom Haberstroh and Amin Elhassan, I joked that Tayshaun Prince's block and a cup of beer ruined my childhood. It's true, the same pre-teen Caitlin who was bugging her dad's coaching buddies about box-and-one defense was also extremely bummed that she wasn't going to get to watch Jermaine O'Neal compete for a title; however, in retrospect, it's probably more accurate to say that those teams made my childhood. Or, at least were a very significant fixture of it.

During All-Star Weekend in Indianapolis a year ago, I was interviewed for a video blog about the heart of Indiana basketball by J. Kyle Mann at The Ringer. When he brought up the fact that I've gotten annoyed a few times on social media when fans from other teams suggest that I'm wasting my time covering the Pacers, I relayed to him that, while it's flattering that fans from other teams want me to write about their team, it means something to me that this is the team that I grew up watching. I was a fan before I was an analyst, and I hope that means something to my readers who also grew up fans of the Pacers. As I was explaining my position, I told him that, as has been noted several times in this writing, Jermaine O'Neal was my favorite player -- even to the point of buying Better Basketball DVDs with walkthroughs of his post footwork that I used to try to emulate at open gyms (yes, as you should all know by now, I was that kid).

As you may have noticed, I never mentioned Malice at the Palace in that interview. It wasn't intentional. It just never crossed my mind. It's not what immediately comes to mind, when I think about my experience as a fan.

I haven't been a fan in a long time. Or rather, I hadn't been a fan in a long time. You lose that part of yourself when you do whatever it is that you call what I do. So often, I'm isolated, alone with my laptop, and focused on the details, for articles, video podcasts, etc., that I've forgotten what it feels like to just … feel.

I had a moment in 2017. My family went to the third home game of the regular season that the Pacers were playing against the Spurs, and I went with them. Victor Oladipo made a game-winner. He turned to the crowd and did his "this is my city" celebration. What a moment! He had more control of his athleticism. His shot was falling, and there was hope in a hopeless place following what was a much-maligned trade. That's what I was thinking about as a writer. As a daughter, sister, and aunt, I was focused on my nephew who was chanting "Di-Po" in rhythm with the fans sitting around him. He was barely three at the time, and after being born with a rare genetic condition that affected his speech development as a toddler, this was also a very special moment. That's what I remember most about Victor Oladipo's tenure with the Pacers -- not his injury or when he eventually chose to make Miami his new city.

Similarly, I don't often think about the Team USA scrimmage with regard to Paul George. My first thought generally goes to his dunk over Birdman in the Eastern Conference Finals, when it seemed like he had barely scratched the surface of what he might later become.

Of course, neither of those players ever went on to play in Game 7 of the NBA Finals. There's an all-time "what if" that will always be attached to Tyrese Haliburton's injury and the 2025 Pacers; but, in some respects, his injury -- which came with him quite literally, as the saying goes, sacrificing himself for the team -- will also forever be attached to and emblematic of what made the 2025 Pacers the 2025 Pacers.

How many teams, with a one-point lead and 20 seconds left to play in overtime of Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals, would go to a sideline out of bounds play that ends up spacing both of their stars out to the logo to create an empty-side three-vs-three opportunity between Andrew Nembhard, Obi Toppin, and Aaron Nesmith, resulting in a dunk? Then again, part of the reason why they were able to rely on their role players in a crucial moment, is because their stars, and particularly Tyrese Haliburton's shot that bounced to the roof of Madison Square Garden, made overtime possible.

In that moment, as I waited for the ball to re-enter the earth's atmosphere, I felt something again. Not so much because I was a fan, but rather, because for that particular game, I was at my parent's house and, for the first time in a long time, I watched my dad being a fan. Now, if I was asked that mailbag question again about my earliest memory of basketball, I think (rather than drawing attention to my nerdy shot-charts) I would say watching my dad's reaction to watching Reggie Miller's heroics to force double-OT in Game 5 against the New Jersey Nets in 2002.

I didn't understand a lot about basketball then (i.e. I wouldn't have even known to ask what a box-and-one defense was), but I understood the emotions and sharing in that moment. I'm never going to forget Tyrese pounding his fist on the floor in pain and what happened in Game 7, but I'm also never going to forget where I was and who I was with when he made a clutch shot in every round of this run. I'm also never going to forget covering my first ever NBA Finals with Samson in Indy.

As many of you may know, Haliburton has long been a supporter of my work, whether on social media, as a guest on podcasts, or from the podium, when he certainly doesn't have to be. This latest hardship is extra "Sad Jeff Teague." Not because of me or my work at Basketball, She Wrote. As I've told everyone, his willingness to use his platform and status in that way says a lot more about who he is as a person than it does about me or the quality of my work. For that reason, the fact that he's that type of person, makes it even harder to reckon with the reality that he doesn't get to show the world the quality of his work -- at least not for a while, anyway.

In the meantime, other players will have chances to step up (and might even provide hope in a hopeless place, just as Oladipo did back in 2017), and the coaching staff and front office will certainly be active (just as they were in patiently guiding and remaking this version of the team). So, when asking why do we do this to ourselves, as far as going through the pain of sports whether, for you, as basketball fans, or for me, as a basketball analyst, it's a little like my dad's relationship to the ABA basketball. He went through a daily cleaning ritual because he couldn't imagine going a day without playing basketball. Moving forward from the "what if" of Game 7 might require a little cleaning, but can you imagine not experiencing everything that led up to that Game 7? Or, everything that precedes the next Game 7?

Lather, rinse, repeat.

The things we do for love!

See you next season.