CNN
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The Oklahoma City Thunder evened up the NBA Finals on Sunday by rolling the Indiana Pacers, easing to a 123-107 victory that washed away some of the bad taste left by the Pacers’ dramatic win in the series’ opening game.
The Thunder broke away from the Pacers in the second quarter with one of the team’s patented extended runs, the kind of sequence that made OKC the NBA’s best team in the regular season and saw them lead the league in point differential.
Led by MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s stellar performance and a strong showing by guard Alex Caruso off the bench, Oklahoma City made an emphatic statement with the blowout win.
For SGA, the 34-point, eight-assist performance was a solid follow up to his 38 points in a losing effort on Thursday. The seventh-year player out of Kentucky is debuting in an impressive way in the Finals, hardly seeming to have put a foot wrong throughout the playoffs as he has dominated in each series.
After the game, Gilgeous-Alexander told ABC that the strong performance in Game 2 was all about moving on from Game 1.
“Basketball is a game of ups and downs, the season’s full of ups and downs, a series is full of ups and downs. It’s about the team that can stay level headed and get better throughout the experiences and they’ll come out on top,” he said.
He added, “We just used the opportunity to get better .we’ve done a really good job of that all year, the last game was no different. Tonight is the same thing; we did some things good tonight, we did some things bad. We’ve got to be able to get better and get ready for Game 3.”
The specter of Game 1 hung over the game in the first quarter as Oklahoma City looked to be pressing a bit more than they were in the early stages of the series opener. The Thunder committed four turnovers as they looked nervous in the opening minutes, though they eventually settled in to end the quarter with a six-point lead.
That momentum carried over into the second quarter as the Thunder extended their lead to 15 points in the first five minutes, forcing Indiana to take a timeout to try and blunt the momentum. The exclamation point was a dunk from Chet Holmgren, who was trying to erase the taste of a poor showing in the series opener – the 7-foot-1, second year player finished Game 1 with six points and a -13 plus-minus rating.
The Pacers weren’t able to change the vibe with the time out and the lead was 23 just a couple minutes later as the Thunder went on a 19-2 run in the second quarter. The Pacers were shooting just 33% from the field as the Thunder were shooting a lights-out 55.6%. The blue-clad crowd at the Paycom Arena was brought to their feet after Shai Gilgeous-Alexander pulled off a reverse layup that caused Pacers head coach Rick Carlisle to call another timeout to try and gather his troops.
Andrew Nebhard hit a bucket to halt the Thunder run, but the damage had been done. The Thunder’s huge run meant that the Pacers were once again staring at pulling off an unlikely comeback if they wanted to come back to Indianapolis with a 2-0 series lead.
The Pacers were able to cut into the lead slightly by halftime, but the Thunder – led by Gilgeous-Alexander’s 15 points – still led by 18. The Thunder’s stifling defense was once again on full display in the first half, holding the Pacers to 34.9% shooting – 31.8% from behind the arc – and forcing nine turnovers. They dominated Indiana in the paint, scoring 26 compared to the Pacers’ 12.
The Pacers made a quick 8-2 run in the early stages of the third quarter to cut into the lead, relying on Miles Turner and Pascal Siakam to drag them back into the game. Tyrese Haliburton, the hero of Game 1, was a non-factor through the first half and into the third quarter – with seven-and-a-half minutes left in the third quarter, Haliburton had just 3 points, three assists and three rebounds.
But the strong play from Gilgeous-Alexander and the balanced OKC offense kept the Pacers at bay. Unlike in Game 1, when the Pacers clawed their way back into the game with a series of third-quarter runs, the Thunder kept going to the MVP and he delivered, finishing the quarter with 27 points. The Thunder’s Jalen Williams, Alex Caruso, Aaron Wiggins and Holmgren all also ended the third quarter in double figures.
Unlike on Thursday, the Thunder refused to take their foot off the gas pedal as the lead surged past 20 in the early part of the fourth quarter. The Pacers continued to take care of the ball much better than they did last week when they had 25 turnovers, but couldn’t find a consistent shooting touch and were dominated by the Thunder on the boards.
Perhaps the most disappointing performance from a Pacer was Haliburton’s dismal showing. The leader of the Pacers was held in check by the Thunder during the two teams’ regular season matchups this year and for nearly all of Thursday’s Game 1. He erased any frustration on Thursday with the clutch shot that won the first game of the Finals and capped off another extraordinary Indiana comeback but his 14-point, 10-rebound, six-assist performance would have been one to forget otherwise.
Before getting into a rhythm in the fourth quarter, when the Thunder still held a 20-plus-point lead and were refusing to let Indiana get any closer, Haliburton was stifled. By the time he got into double digits in the points column, Oklahoma City was far out of striking range. He finished with 17 points, 12 of those coming in the fourth quarter.
It was a testament to Luguentz Dort, the man tasked with guarding Haliburton through much of the night and helped force the star guard into five turnovers.
“With them, that’s where it starts,” Gilgeous-Alexander told ABC of the Pacers’ offense. “They’re a high-powered offense; they play fast and score a bunch of points. If you don’t get stops, you’ll end up running all game and they can beat you that way.”
The series now shifts to Indianapolis for Games 3 and 4 later on in the week. The Pacers will host the Thunder at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.
The convincing win isn’t going to change the Thunder’s mindset going into the break before Wednesday’s game.
“You can’t get comfortable. You’ve gotta focus on the little things, recovery, get ready for the game plan and ultimately, I’m going to sound like a broken record, but getting better for the next game and the next opportunity,” he told ABC.
