What the Haliburton!?! Pacers stun Cavs to take 2-0 series lead

My work at Basketball, She Wrote is typically paywalled. This video podcast with Samson Folk, discussing an all-time playoff sequence for the Pacers, is available as a free trial for everyone. If you're new here and want to support independent writing about actual basketball, please consider subscribing and/or sharing it around. Alright, onto the spoken and written words about the Pacers

By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper

For the second time in roughly a week, the Pacers barely mustered 15 points in the first quarter. Also, for the second time in roughly a week, the Pacers trailed by as many as 20 points. And yet, for the second time in roughly a week, Tyrese Haliburton and the Pacers beat the front-runner allegations, rallying in the final seconds to steal Game 2 and homecourt advantage with a series of clutch plays which can only be described in the aggregate as:

"What the Haliburton!?!"

Joining me to find the words for a game in which, yet again, there are no words is Samson Folk, as we breakdown the latest way that the Pacers went about finding a way while also going over the wide-ranging impact of Cleveland's face-guarding coverage against Haliburton, the possible reasons for Pascal Siakam's relatively muted performance, Bennedict Mathurin's quietly loud contributions and much, much more. Enjoy!

Here are the relevant timestamps:

0:00 - Introductions

2:16 - Contributing factors in the non-existent possession war to start the game

5:22 - Wide-ranging impact of Okoro face-guarding Haliburton + the various strategies that were attempted to combat the exaggerated coverage

14:53 - The Pacers cycling through defensive hacks against the force of nature that was Donovan Mitchell

20:55 - Pascal Siakam's odd game

24:02 - Bennedict Mathurin inserting himself into the action in contrast to Siakam

26:43 - Possible reasons for Siakam's odd game + how the injuries for Cleveland changed the context of the match-up

45:29 - No ref talk, please

49:00 - Brief aside on Samson's life playing sports in Saskatchewan

52:39 - Reacting to the series of improbable events that was one of the greatest sequences in Pacers history + remembering what it's like to be a fan again

1:04:54 - Oh btw, Nembhard stole the tip again

1:07:34 - The rise in anti-intellectualism and anti-earnestness (of course)

1:10:24 - Thank you and goodbye!