The Indiana Pacers gave themselves a chance to knock off the top seed in the western conference but couldn’t finish the job against the Oklahoma City Thunder as they lost 120-114.

After a fantastic first quarter that saw the Pacers get out to a 29-19 lead, SGA started to take over as he finished with 45 points on 15 of 22 shooting. Meanwhile the Pacers star point guard Tyrese Haliburton was invisible for much of the game as he finished with only six shot attempts and 4 points as Indiana chose to run its offense through Andrew Nembhard as the primary ballhandler in an attempt to be more random according to Rick Carlisle. To the Pacers credit, the game was tied with a little over two minutes remaining at 107 but OKC closed this one out with their superstar.

The Thunder had just three turnovers as it was only the fourth time in the last 40 years that a Pacers opponent has had less than four turnovers in a game according to Basketball Reference. While the Pacers won the rebounding battle and only turned the ball over 11 times, the combination of SGA going nuclear, Haliburton being invisible, and the Thunder gaining 17 points on those turnovers was too much to overcome in the end.

To discuss the game and the current state of the Pacers, I joined Tony East on Locked on Pacers. Always a good time, you can watch below or listen anywhere you typically find your podcasts.

Topics include:

• Why the Pacers went with their curious strategy of running the offense through Andrew Nembhard primarily instead of Tyrese Haliburton
• Obi Toppin’s injury and how Jarace Walker stepped up with some massive plays in his absence
• Pacers 5-game win streak comes to an end but is this loss further reason for optimism?
• The brutal upcoming schedule
• Myles Turner’s continued solid presence defending the rim.
• Bennedict Mathurin making quick decisions but the shots haven’t been falling
• And more