Four teams remain in the hunt for the NBA title. As for the East, the Boston Celtics will play host to the Indiana Pacers at TD Garden to get the Eastern Conference Finals rolling.
While the Celtics have been a staple in the Conference Finals since the Jayson Tatum era, this will be the first time since 2014 that the Pacers will step foot this far into the Playoffs.
Read on below as SBOTOP previews this monumental Game 1 of the 2024 NBA Eastern Conference Finals.
Talking Points
Pacers make their first Conference finals appearance since 2014
What a time to be a Pacers fan! To say that they’re having a successful 2023–24 campaign would be an understatement. The Carlisle-led Pacers made an impact early in the season after beating both the Bucks and the Celtics to reach the inaugural In-Season Tournament final to face the Los Angeles Lakers.
The spearhead to their success has evidently been their All-Star floor general, Tyrese Haliburton, who averaged 20 points, 10.9 assists, 3.9 rebounds, and 1.2 steals to lead the Pacers to a sixth-place finish in the East.
His importance to the team was magnified when the Pacers went on their worst run of the season after the 24-year-old went down with a hamstring injury.
However, with Haliburton healthy, the Pacers are having a strong postseason performance, beating the likes of Milwaukee and New York to reach the Eastern Conference finals.
Now, with a run-and-gun style of play orchestrated by Rick Carlisle, the Pacers will now embark on the toughest quest of their impressive season. They will have to go against the Boston Celtics, the final boss in the East, to clinch the conference and go to the NBA Finals, a feat they’ve yet to reach since the 2000 season when they faced the Shaq, Kobe, and the rest of the Los Angeles Lakers.
Tatum needs to find his stroke to match the Pacers’ offence
It’s not a surprise that the Boston Celtics are one of the teams featured in the ECF, especially after putting up unparalleled NBA 2024 results in the regular season.
Also, it’s important to keep in mind that, as good as the Celtics have been in the playoffs, they’re still dealing with Tatum’s offensive woes and an injured Kristaps Porzingis. And this leaves this SBOTOP writer pondering: If the Celtics made it to the ECF with an inconsistent Tatum and an injured Porzingis, imagine how much more dominant they could be if they’re clicking on all cylinders.
Well, the latest updates on Porzingis state that the big man isn’t expected to play in Games 1 or 2 this week, but a return deeper in the ECF isn’t ruled out just yet.
This leaves Jayson Tatum’s shooting slump. While the Celtics boast one of the best defences in the league this season, they’ll face a tenacious and erratic offence from the Pacers. And in today’s game, sometimes you just have to fight fire with fire.
Despite his impressive counting stats, Tatum will need to be the 27PPG scorer he was in the regular season to get past the Pacers in the Conference finals, more so in the absence of their star big man, Kristaps Porzingis. But with the calibre of player Tatum is, I find it difficult to imagine that the Celtics leader won’t get back to his scoring ways soon, especially after his 56/43/100 shooting splits in their series-clinching game against the Cavaliers.
History
The Celtics and the Pacers went back and forth throughout the 2023–24 season. The Celtics may have had a slight advantage in their recent head-to-heads, but the Pacers managed to beat the Celtics in the In-Season Tournament earlier in the campaign.
It’s also important to take note that the Pacers have lost every game at TD Garden this season, so expect the Celtics to exploit their home advantage in the first two games of the series.
What are the odds?
The NBA 2024 betting odds have the Celtics installed as significant 1.21 favourites to win Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals, while the visiting Pacers, despite their dominant showing at Madison Square Garden, are the underdogs at 4.03.
As stated above, both contestants are bound to fight fire with fire. The Pacers are expected to showcase their blazing offence, while Boston have enough firepower to match Indiana’s tenacity, which is why the even line for their over-unders is 222.0 at 1.93.
Disclaimer: Odds are correct at time of publish.
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