The Pacers keep getting targeted by the same action

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By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper 

After starting the fourth quarter with a made three from Buddy Hield that put the Pacers up, 103-97, the Miami Heat proceeded to go on a 13-4 run with Bam Adebayo out for the game and Jimmy Butler on the bench. During that stretch, Jamie Jaquez outscored the Pacers, who suddenly couldn't throw a rock in the ocean, as he took advantage of wandering eyes to cut inside and used his big body to battle to his spot as a facsimile for Butler until Butler returned to do more of the same.

In this case, "more of the same" not only speaks to taking over for Jaquez, but also serves as a reference for scoring out of an action that has come to be emblematic as a recurring cause of concern for everything that is concerning about the defensive end of the floor for the Pacers.

It's happened at least once in almost every recent loss, and it isn't anything new or particularly fancy. In fact, the Pacers have been incorporating this very same screening action since the last time Rick Carlisle coached the Pacers -- over 15 years ago. Here's where the trouble starts and all too often finishes. This was the first possession of the game against the Toronto Raptors. Known as a "slice" screen, it's a backscreen for a player set at the wing.

Most of the time in the NBA, the main purpose of that backscreen is to create a moment of lag from the screener's defender, forcing them to be late arriving at the hand-off at the top of the key after sagging off to protect against the cut. In essence, it's an action to set up another action.

Or, at least it should be. For the Pacers, it rarely has to get that far. Pascal Siakam has shot 12-of-62 on above the break threes this season, and Jakob Poeltl hasn't even attempted a shot from deep. And yet, look at how Myles Turner is straddling the three-point line at the same time as Obi Toppin is fixated only on what's directly in front of him. That would be understandable if Toronto's starting lineup was loaded with off-ball movers, capable of rising up and firing out of a hand-off, but Dennis Schröder has yet to make a three as a hand-off receiver. For that reason, it's difficult to understand why Turner needs to be pressing up against Poeltl that closely as a non-shooting big, rather than dropping back into the paint. On the season, the Pacers have held opponents to the lowest three-point attempt rate in the NBA, but they're conceding the highest rim frequency and rank dead-last in paint-points allowed. In addition to defending the pick-and-roll two-versus-two and aiming to defend individual match-ups without doubling as much as possible, this is part of the reason why.

When Bruce Brown doesn't get on the under side of the switch, no one even has a foot in the paint to help, let alone rotate to the rim. And, here's the thing: Even if Brown had executed the switch properly, how much of a chance would he have to withstand the physicality of Scottie Barnes?

Just ask T.J. McConnell. When the same scenario played out in Boston, he stayed in front of the mismatch, but the combination of Jayson Tatum's size, footwork, and tough shot-making was still quite obviously a mismatch, nonetheless.

Over the last few games, the Pacers have been less dogmatic with single coverage. The only problem is, they still look like a team that has largely been dogmatic with regard to single coverage. Granted, these possessions didn't originate out of slice screens, but this is largely a demonstration in how not to rotate out of double-teams and it wasn't just a one-off -- it happened multiple times.

If they are going to double from the post-entry passer or with the next nearest defender, then the rotations have to be kept in front on the flight of the ball. As in, when McConnell smashes down to double, Hield rotates over to Schröder with Mathurin rotating to Gary Trent Jr. and Smith staying in front of Poeltl until McConnell can either bump him out to Otto Porter Jr. or sprint to Otto Porter Jr. himself. There is no reason for Mathurin to be sinking down next to Poeltl, much less keeping a hand on him while creating a wide open kick-out avenue.

On the flip side, he also can't wait multiple dribbles to go double when Haliburton is getting bullied. This is why he got audibly chastised. Again, when the Pacers double, they double from the next nearest defender and keep the rotations in front. When he smashes down, Malcolm Brogdon wouldn't be wide open. Nesmith would rotate on the flight of the ball.

Mathurin has shown he's capable of more than this, and the Pacers need him to demonstrate those capabilities more consistently -- particularly when he isn't guarding the ball. To that point, there's reason to quibble, yet again, with why the Pacers are playing the big this closely when old friend Goga Bitadze has attempted two threes for a Magic team that, like Toronto, doesn't have many options to gun from deep out of hand-offs, but miscues like this also go back to that word "disposition" that keeps getting thrown around.

Even if they give up size, a slice screen shouldn't be generating that much separation while everyone else is glued to the perimeter. If they aren't going to switch, in order to keep Brown on Wagner, and they don't want to hedge-and-recover, in order to avoid giving Wagner a potential step on Brown, then Mathurin can't get hung up on the screen. Still, that doesn't change the fact that they are giving up size, even when their best defenders are both involved in the action. When Butler reentered the game in the fourth quarter on Thursday night, Miami quickly joined Boston, Orlando, and Toronto as the latest team to slice up the Pacers with slice screens.

To be fair, Butler probably got away with a push off against Brown on this possession, but the end result still looks like a repeat of the same film. When the slice screen snags Nesmith, Brown has to switch and is unable to impact the lob pass to the bigger wing with no one around to help.

The Heat have more firepower to contend with on the perimeter than was the case against Orlando and Toronto, but something still has to give here when they don't have anything else to give from the standpoint of length. By comparison, Andrew Nembhard tried to fight physicality with physicality, push switching to remove the momentum from the action, but he couldn't get a hand on the overhead pass either and once he couldn't, he should've conceded and flipped around to defend Butler straight-up.

Instead, he picked up his sixth foul, which meant he was no longer available to keep the ball moving as a connector, like he was earlier in the game, when the Heat dialed up the pressure against Haliburton and Hield's shots weren't falling.

That said, the Pacers lost a game in which they amassed 132 points with Haliburton putting up a career-best scoring performance, tallying 44 points to go with 10 assists in 40 minutes played. As always, the defense doesn't need to be good. It doesn't even need to be mediocre. It merely needs to be bad, and it too often reverts to being terrible, squandering the stellar play of Haliburton by surrendering 45 points in the fourth quarter. Slice screens certainly didn't account for everything that went awry on that end of the floor when a six-point lead rapidly disintegrated into a double-figure loss, but the ongoing struggles to defend that action and the fact that they keep being targeted by that action without it even being connected to another action, encapsulates the friction that exists as to why they aren't providing more resistance, particularly against teams with size.

The players can certainly improve at chasing through the screens or switching to at least force shots over the top instead of at the rim, and the scheme probably needs to be more flexible as far as how much attention is being paid to the perimeter when the floor is inverted, with bigs operating on the perimeter and smaller players attacking the paint, but even if they make those adjustments and cut back on miscues, the internal development isn't going to coincide with literal growth -- at least not until Jarace Walker looks ready to be reasonably ready.

All of which is to say that, at a certain point, the Pacers are probably going to have to be just as aggressive in searching for outside answers as they have been in calling for answers to come from within. Otherwise, there will likely continue to be more of these nights when they end up falling short trying to outrun their own, short-limbed deficiencies, while being locked into outrunning and outgunning their opponents.