2025 NBA Finals: 3 Reasons Why Pacers Can Beat Thunder

2025 NBA Finals: 3 Reasons Why Pacers Can Beat Thunder

The 2025 NBA Finals tips off Thursday between the Oklahoma City Thunder and Indiana Pacers! The league’s best defense is pinned against one of the league’s best offenses! The MVP versus another one of the league’s best young point guards! Two teams that fly up-and-down the court with pace, but with contrasting styles!

I can’t wait for these to start. Could the Indiana Pacers do the unthinkable and capture their first-ever NBA Title? Here are three reasons why they could knock off the 68-win Thunder!

Rooted In Efficiency:

We will touch on their beautifully chaotic pace below. However, Indiana’s offense has been remarkably efficient this postseason, particularly from beyond the arc. Perhaps they regress to the mean at the worst possible time, but Indiana’s shot 40.1 percent from deep this postseason–the best mark in the NBA by *checks notes* 2.1 percentage points.

They’re going to need to shoot the 3-ball well against Oklahoma City, who make opposing offenses feel like there’s 10 defenders on the floor instead of five. They’re the most disruptive defense I’ve seen, and if you’re fortunate enough to move the ball well enough on a given possession, you can stumble into an open 3 in the corner or above-the-break. If the Pacers make them at the clip they were in the first three series, the pressure will be on Oklahoma City, which has struggled from 3 this postseason, to do the same.

Chaos Is Controlled:

The Pacers deploy layers upon layers of constant motion where everyone’s mind is rapidly moving at a pace that short-circuits the speedometer. Yet, their beautifully chaotic process is quite controlled.

Indiana’s turned the rock over on just 12.7 percent of its possessions this postseason, the third-best mark in the NBA; during the regular season, they turned it over on just 13.0 percent of their possessions. Tyrese Haliburton isn’t afraid to make one gasp when he randomly jumps in the air to get rid of the ball, but there’s always a method to Indiana’s madness.

Neither of these turn the ball over, but it will be incredibly important for Indiana to prevent turnovers against Oklahoma City’s ultra-disruptive defense. The Pacers will seek as many hit-ahead passes as possible, but their chaos must be controlled.

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Battle Of Boards:

Both teams are fairly evenly matched on the glass, but the Pacers have a slight advantage on the defensive glass while the Thunder are more active on the offensive glass. Rebounding wins championships, and if you can limit the extra bites that Oklahoma City has, you can win this series (as long as you’re able to score on the offensive end). Indiana’s held its own against Milwaukee, New York and Cleveland on the glass, with those last two being above-average rebounding teams.

Teams that win in the margins win championships. Whether it’s turnovers (mentioned above), free throws (Indiana fouls a lot), making threes (mentioned above), converting in the paint or winning the battle on the boards, Indiana has to win in the margins to win this series. I can’t emphasize that enough. The Pacers’ margin for error is extraordinarily thin, point blank.

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