What the Pacers need in a big, based on how they came up short

The following is my response to a mailbag question in which patron Tyler Bishop asked what traits the Pacers should be looking for in a center, specifically to optimize Tyrese Haliburton

By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper

As it applies to the unexpected amount of bulletin board material that was strewn about after a certain center absconded for the pastures that are supposedly greener wherever he goes (after all, he will be wearing a green uniform), it's typically best just to let bygones be bygones. When it comes to looking ahead at who or what type of center should fill that position long-term, however, there's arguably a case for dwelling on the past for just a bit longer in order to potentially build a better future. As was written in the immediate aftermath of the news that Indiana's starting center would soon be Milwaukee's starting center, it's obvious how Tyrese Haliburton enhanced Myles Turner's game. The same wasn't always quite as clear in the reverse, particularly in the later rounds of the playoffs.

As such, based on the two series that the Pacers lost the last two seasons, here's what stands out as needs, specifically to optimize Haliburton.

Attacking mismatches & cross-matches

Boston and Oklahoma City switched more frequently against Tyrese Haliburton as the pick-and-roll ball-handler, trading assignments on 27.9 percent of his screens, than what was the case for the league as a whole during the regular season (24.6 percent). Relatedly, the Haliburton-Turner pick-and-roll combo went from producing 1.137 points per chance prior to those postseasons to just 1.091 points per chance in the 2024 Eastern Conference Finals and 2025 NBA Finals. Meanwhile, Turner scored just 13.9 player points per 100 half-court match-ups when defended by guards in those series, compared to 25.3 during the regular season. All of which means there wasn't much to dissuade the Celtics and Thunder from guarding him with smaller defenders, as he found himself opposite from guards on 24.4 percent of his half-court match-ups, up from 10.8 percent over the 2023-24 and 2024-25 regular seasons.

There's just a lot of counterintuitive possessions, where he either doesn't recognize the mismatch or turns what could be an easy shot in the paint into a more difficult shot on the perimeter. Just look at these static screenshots against the Celtics. This is semi-transition, requiring him to read-and-react. The Pacers have a 5-on-4 advantage. And yet, he doesn't step in front of 6-foot-4 Derrick White at the block for the potential wing entry into the post.

Instead, as Ben Sheppard attacks baseline, he actually starts to leave the paint, presumably to pull behind the drive, rather than manufacturing the angle for the drop-off pass.

Sheppard expects the latter, which means Turner catches the ball as he's moving away from the basket. Still, this could be a quick rip move followed by a pound dribble to access the rim against 6-foot-7 Sam Hauser, right?

Nope. With 16 seconds left on the shot-clock, he retreated further to hoist a step-back three.

Those same tendencies also showed up in the Finals. If he's going to be guarded by 6-foot-6 Shai Gilgeous-Alexander following a switch, then he actually needs to force him to guard him.

This should be a quick swim move.

Instead, after standing behind the smaller guard on the block, he once again vacated the paint, only to launch a contested, one-dribble three against an indirect closeout.

Notably, in usual OKC fashion, Shai flocked to Haliburton's drive rather than following Turner out of the paint (i.e. Turner wasn't stretching the defense when he didn't have the ball). Then, when Lu Dort and Alex Caruso both sequentially flocked to him with the ball on the perimeter, rotating from the weak-side, Turner missed making the extra pass to a wide open Andrew Nembhard. Over both series, he finished with more than twice as a many turnovers (31) as made threes (13), and Haliburton reached the paint on an even lower percentage of his touches against the Thunder with Turner on the floor (7.91 percent) than off (8.94 percent).

Haliburton grew in his persistence to push the ball downhill against switches during this past playoff run, but he saw help on 82.4 percent of his drives during the Finals, which was up from 73.2 percent over the prior three rounds. Granted, a lot of that is specific to how the Thunder scheme their defense in chasing the ball while loading up at the blocks and elbows, but that reinforces why a "center" of inverse gravity would've been beneficial as a counterweight.

For example, it says a lot that the Celtics were fine cross-matching against him without doubling, and it also says a lot that he went to a turnaround fadeaway instead of holding his spot for a lob pass or at least attempting to move toward the basket on the catch.

In that way, the long-term answer at the five doesn't necessarily need to be a beast on the block (i.e. Pascal Siakam plays for the Pacers), but there probably should be some consideration for finding someone who can more readily find their feel when not being defended by players their own size.

Spacing/Positioning

That also applies to knowing where to space after setting a screen or when not directly involved in the action. Haliburton spent a large majority of the Finals being face-guarded by Lu Dort. When the defense has eyes only for the star guard, the center either needs to veer into a pindown to spring him free or play four-on-four with the secondary ball-handler.

Put simply, they can't exist in liminal space, meandering into Nembhard's driving lane without sticking the off-ball pick for Haliburton.

Also, if it's going to take 12 seconds to get to the preferred screening combination, then there can't be more meandering, neither sealing against the switch, spacing out to the perimeter, putting down anchor in the dunker spot, or setting a flare screen for Haliburton to occupy the help, until the ball-handler finally has to create from mid-range.

Needless to say, if space isn't going to be carved out for Haliburton, then the space he generates with his mere presence has to be diligently optimized, as if solving a math problem via order of operations, rather than just moving for the sake of movement.

Screen craft

That said, better screen help would of course be of help. During the regular season and against some playoff opponents, this may not matter as much, as Haliburton is among the league's leaders in screen rejections. With his ability to dictate pace and pick apart emergency rotations, it can be extremely difficult to connect with him and direct the ball in transition. That calculus changed in the Finals, though. Again, in addition to face-guarding him the full-length of the floor, OKC's defense is designed to pounce on driving lanes. To counter for their confining off-ball defense, the Pacers pivoted to more hand-offs and "get" actions during the fourth quarter of Game 2, in which Haliburton racked up 12 points after being held to just five through the first three frames.

It was too little too late in that game, but the Pacers increased the volume of hand-offs for Haliburton when the series shifted back to Indiana, tallying 17 in Game 4, which was the most he received in any game last season. The only problem was, they only generated 0.714 points per chance out of those actions. For frame of reference, the Charlotte Hornets ranked last in hand-off efficiency last season, at 0.873 points per chance. On the one hand, catching the ball at full speed should make loading up in the gaps more difficult. On the other hand, no one needs to load up in the gaps if the hand-off is, well, this hands on.

Granted, that should've been a foul on Dort, but the reason Dort is even in position to foul Haliburton is because Turner so rarely dribbles at the on-ball defender or adjusts his screen with a two-foot lateral hop in order to actually stick the defender after getting off the ball.

Turner's passive spacing was key to how the Pacers were able to shape-shift between different alignments, morphing from 4-out to 5-out, but in that series, there was also something to be said for opening attacking lanes by creating space with contact.

To be fair, Turner made contact on 67.9 percent of his screens in the Finals, which was a higher frequency than what he registered in the prior series against New York (65.8 percent), Milwaukee (62.0 percent), or Cleveland (61.5 percent), but screens require a different artform from hand-offs, and he didn't always make the most of what contact he made. Here, after screening the back-pocket of Jalen Williams, Haliburton could've led him with a pass if he had stopped to hold his spot in front of the switch. Then, even if Dort had sunk down from the wing to tag, as can be seen below, the opportunity (which was missed) still would've been there for Turner to set a seal screen (or Gortat screen) on Williams in the lane for Nembhard to continue his drive to the rim.

In that way, what could've been a screen assist ended up resulting in a turnover. The Pacers ranked among the top-five in spread pick-and-rolls per 100 possessions last season, but they are oftentimes a team that plays inside-outside-inside, looking for opportunities for high-seals in transition within the first seven seconds of the shot-clock before morphing to a 5-out alignment and then, if necessary, potentially finishing with a big in the lane who can screen out the rim protector from protecting the rim on drives. As such, the next long-term answer at the five, will obviously provide flexibility for Haliburton if they can pull from deep, but the deeper the team advances in the playoffs, the more they will also need to be able to dig deep with hand-off and screening angles.

Rebounding

The team that grabbed more offensive rebounds than their opponent went 6-1 in the NBA Finals, with the lone exception being when OKC won the offensive rebounding battle 9-7 in Game 3, but lost by a score of 116-107. For the series, Turner finished with as many defensive rebounds (22) as T.J. McConnell (22), who played 48 fewer minutes than him. Granted, that is somewhat reductive, as total number of rebounds doesn't account for makes and misses as far as how many rebounds were actually available. Plus, it doesn't really matter who grabs the rebound as long as someone grabs the rebound. Still, the Thunder posted a significantly higher offensive rebounding rate on missed twos (34.9 percent) than the Pacers (26.9 percent) when Turner was on the floor in the Finals, and among the 21 players in that series who recorded at least 50 rebounding chances off field-goal attempts, he ranked 17th in how often he converted those chances into a rebound, per Genius Sports.

Like Mitchell Robinson in the prior series, Isaiah Hartenstein is a load on the glass, oftentimes requiring chest-to-chest box-outs in order to prevent him from generating second chances. It would be understandable if he pushed Turner under the rim or if someone else scored at the rim because Turner's attention was turned toward Hartenstein. This can't happen off a missed floater. Not only for the sake of limiting extra shots, but also for the purpose of jump-starting the offense in transition.

For the series, the Pacers logged 17.1 percent of their possessions in transition with an average time to first action of just 3.9 seconds following a missed field-goal from the Thunder, compared to a transition frequency of 4.3 percent with an average time to first action of 7.4 seconds following a made field-goal. As such, another way for Haliburton to circumvent the squeeze of OKC's boa constrictor-like help principles would've been to finish more stops with rebounds, outrunning the feast on driving lanes in the half-court by feeding him more outlet passes in transition.

Concurrently, another factor to consider with regard to rebounding at the center position, especially when Hartenstein was on the floor, is that the threat of creating holes on the glass likely contributed to why the Pacers were reluctant to play their zone with Haliburton at the bottom, keeping him out of screening actions, despite the fact that OKC was the most zoned team in the league last season and scored fewer points per possession in the playoffs against zone (1.128) than man coverage (1.159).

All of which is to say that, when evaluating what traits the Pacers should be on the lookout for from the center position to enhance Haliburton's game, rather than just considering the ways in which he will enhance the player who plays at center, a lot of what was missing at the five spot comes down not only to building up the level of physicality, with regard to moving bodies on the glass, in the lane, and as a screener/hand-off operator, but also as it pertains to building out the feel that so naturally extends from Haliburton. It won't be enough just to play literally bigger at the big position, the long-term answer at center, whether in recognizing how to respace the floor or when and where they should assert themselves, also needs to be able to rapidly sort through the shortcomings, especially against shorter players, of where they came up short.