Heat prepare to zoom past Pacers into NBA Finals, sooner rather than later
By
Ethan Brisby
@ethanbrisby
The
Miami Heat have a chance to do tonight what so many basketball fans thought they
would not do until June 1, eliminate the Indiana Pacers. The Pacers looked
abysmal in the First Round of the NBA Playoff tournament against Atlanta. They
were mediocre-at-best in defeating the Washington Wizards in Round 2. Yet,
fans, mostly Heat dissenters assumed they could somehow pick up the pace to run
and gun with the 2-time defending champion Miami Heat. There almost certainly will
be no Game 7 as many anticipated, and there may not even be a Game 6 if Indiana
cannot muster up the strength to win Game 5 tonight at home.
Many
of the fans I talk to on a weekly basis who went out on a limb to pick Indiana
in this series did so simply because Indiana challenged the Champions last
year. They came close, I’ll admit, but where I am from, close still only counts
in horse shoes and hand grenades. In professional sports, you do not get any
credit for almost doing anything.
So
here we have the Pacers who for all intents and purposes, had a better regular
season record this year than last, and even beat Miami late in the regular season.
Yet, they have looked nowhere near the team that pushed Miami to the brink of
elimination last season. The Pacers started feeling themselves. They began
believing the hype that they may just be able to dethrone Miami, break up the
dynasty and make the Midwest relevant. Well, we have Johnny Manziel in
Cleveland for that, and from the looks of things, Lebron and crew will be
hanging around to make good on their promise of not two, not three, not four,
not five, not six, but seven championship.
While
it’s a little early to know if they’ll pull off a UCLA like domination in this
NBA, this season, they certainly appear to be the best team. They just have not
been beat down the way every other team has to this point. Miami can win on
anyone’s home court, the feed off the snooty yet emphatic fan support they get
in South Beach, and they have three of the top 15 or 20 players in their primes;
not to mention Jesus Shuttlesworth aka Ray Allen for 911 rescues.
As
for Indiana, Lance Stephenson is a free agent this off season, and he will
almost certainly want to play somewhere he can be the number one option. At 23,
I do not blame him, but I certainly would advise him to go somewhere where he
can win. He is not ready to be THE man on a team, I do not believe. So he might
want to get locked into a system with young talented players that will defer to
him.
For
now, let’s hope he’s learned his lesson about talking smack to people like
Lebron James. We know you are from New York, Lance, but championships are won inside TV screens not with eye-opening newspaper quotes. The Pacers have learned that the hard way. Better luck next time.
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