New season tour of the Pacers: Losing Turner is not the end of the world, the ceiling of building a team around Harry is high

In the playoffs of the 2025 season, the Pacers wrote a wonderful fairy tale as a dark horse. However, the ending of the fairy tale was not perfect. The fall of Haliburton in the life-and-death battle brought the team's dark horse journey to an abrupt end. In the end, they were only the last step away from winning the championship trophy. Not long after the start of the offseason, Pacers fans were hit again. The team's main center Turner was poached by the Bucks. In the new season, the team's immediate combat ability at the 1st and 5th positions has declined significantly. Does this mean that the new era of the Pacers has come to an abrupt end? How should the Pacers continue to build the team in the future? Today's article will be shared with you in detail:

1. Review of last season

The Pacers won 3 more games in the regular season in the 25th season than in the 24th season, but the net rating per 100 rounds dropped by two places. The main reason is that the team's offensive efficiency ranking, which ranked second in the 24th season, has slipped. Nesmith's large absence and McConnell's touch callback are the main reasons. But on the other hand, the Pacers have shown good progress on the defensive end, and their defensive efficiency has improved significantly by 10 places. From the perspective of the four defensive elements, they have maintained aggressiveness on the defensive end while greatly reducing the foul rate and losing offensive rebounds. The team has become more systematic on the defensive end.

Judging from the key statistics, the Pacers are an excellent pick-and-roll team. Their pick-and-roll ball-handling and pick-and-roll receiving are both efficient. Haliburton and McConnell can use pick-and-rolls to create a large number of high-quality opportunities for their teammates with very few mistakes. In addition, the Pacers are very dynamic on the offensive end. Their conversion efficiency is at the top level in the league. With three guards on the court for a long time, they even surpass the Warriors in passing average and rank first. Players move very fast on both ends of the offense and defense. The concept of sharing the ball is deeply rooted in the team's bones.

In addition, don’t underestimate Harry’s important value on the passing and control end. Under Harry’s organization, the team’s production of wide-open 3-pointers ranked first in the league and created a large number of high-quality opportunities. The advantage of low difficulty in developing opportunities on the offensive end also helped the Pacers have the fifth-highest winning rate when facing the top 6 teams in the league. This paved the way for the Pacers to create miracles in the playoffs.

2. Offseason review

For Pacers fans, the offseason was as painful as the playoffs were sweet. They unexpectedly lost Turner, the team's main center, and this was completely the result that the management took for granted. They thought that other teams did not have room to sign Turner naked during the offseason, so they tried their best to lower the contract renewal price. As a result, they were intercepted by the aggressive Bucks. This also reflects the problem that small ball markets have difficulty retaining important role players in the context of unwillingness to pay the luxury tax. However, losing Turner is not the end of the world for the Pacers, because the team's star Haliburton is an underestimated top player. As long as he can quickly find his form after his comeback, he is still a trustworthy cornerstone of the team. So how to fill the vacancy of Turner? Next, let's talk about why the Pacers always perform amazingly in the playoffs:

3. Why do the Pacers break out as soon as they arrive in the playoffs?

In the 2025 season, the Pacers went all the way to the 7th tiebreaker in the finals before finally losing. This was very inconsistent with their regular season ranking of only 8th. So what is the secret of the team's ability to "upset" consecutive victories against powerful enemies? In the table above, I calculated the four elements of offense and defense of the Pacers in the regular season and playoffs last season. It can be seen that the Pacers' effective field goal percentage in each round of the playoffs was higher than that of their opponents, and the margin was much higher than in the regular season. This is enough to make up for their shortcomings in free throw rate and rebound protection.

The difference in effective field goal percentage is a reflection of both offense and defense. Except for the Thunder, the Pacers' effective field goal percentage in the three rounds of the Eastern Conference playoffs was higher than that of the regular season. This is really not easy under the high intensity of the playoffs, and it also reflects the team's excellent ability to develop offense! On the other hand, the effective field goal percentages of the Pacers' opponents are lower than those of the Pacers' opponents in the regular season, which shows that the team's quality on the defensive end is much higher than in the regular season.

In fact, the Pacers showed their strong strength in the playoffs as early as the 24th season. They entered the Eastern Conference Finals with the 12th place in the regular season, but were only defeated by the Celtics, who were as dominant as the Universe. The core reason why the Pacers reached the Eastern Conference Finals in the 24th season was also the "effective shooting percentage difference." If it is an accident, then being able to do it with the same core lineup for two consecutive seasons is enough to reflect the Pacers' outstanding offensive and defensive strength in the playoffs!

So how do the Pacers do this? The reason for the improvement on the defensive end is obvious - players who are good at defense get a greater share of minutes in the playoffs. As shown in the picture above, the average time per game of the team's two core perimeter defenders, Nembhard and Nesmith, increased significantly in the playoffs compared with the regular season. At the same time, players such as Marceline, Tob, and Walker, who have poor defensive influence, spent significantly less time in the playoffs. When the team's starting five, except for Haliburton, are all high-quality defenders, the team's improvement on the defensive end is naturally significant.

The reasons for the improvement on the offensive end are more complicated. Many people will attribute the reason to "the Pacers have good depth", but in fact, we can see from the above regular season & playoff onoffs. Except for the starting five, the playoff onoff values ​​​​of the rest of the rotation players are negative and very negative. In other words, their main contribution on the field is to "give the main players sufficient rest time, but they cannot help the team win points." My personal guess is that the reason why Carlisle forcibly maintains the rotation depth is that he hopes the team will be full of energy for 48 minutes, because they move very fast on both offense and defense, which consumes a lot of physical energy. The team needs "consumable players" to help the main players rest.. So it's not that the Pacers have good depth, but that their core lineup is powerful enough when they are full of energy!

Is it because the Pacers players "exploded three-pointers in the playoffs and their true shooting percentage increased significantly"? Judging from the above table, only Marceline, Nesmith and Shepard have significantly improved their effective shooting percentage at the playoff level. However, except for Nesmith, the average time per game of the other two players in the playoffs has declined significantly, and the randomness of the shooting percentage is not obviously reflected in the core rotation players.

In my opinion, the reason why the Pacers broke out as soon as they entered the playoffs is because this group of players developed a deep chemical reaction and formed a very solid offensive integrity during the two and a half years of running-in. This can be seen from the above table of the Pacers' progress. It can be seen from the offensive style - during the regular season, the Pacers are a team that is very good at "making quick decisions". Their offensive rhythm is the seventh fastest in the league, and the ball movement speed is the fastest in the league, even surpassing the passing team Warriors. The player's movement speed on the offensive end is also among the top 10 in the league. In the playoffs, the Pacers ranked first in player and ball movement speed. This team's basketball style is very similar to the Warriors that just emerged in the 2015 season. When players on the court can quickly make correct decisions and are willing to share the ball, it is logical that the offensive end will be unstoppable. It’s done ~ So as long as the Pacers’ core group of players remains stable, especially the players who are good at handling the ball, the gorgeous offense will not disappear. Just like the Warriors’ fifth position changed back then, but as long as Ku Chuitang remains unchanged, the team’s offensive integrity will still be outstanding.

Finally, let’s talk about the loss caused by Turner’s departure to the Pacers. My personal understanding is that “the loss is relatively large but far from fatal.” The table above is Turner's Onoff data for the past three years, including the regular season and playoffs. It can be seen that Turner's value to the team is mainly on the offensive end. When he is on the court, the team's offensive efficiency will definitely improve significantly. Especially in the playoffs, the offensive efficiency Onoff has exceeded 10 points for two consecutive years. However, at the same time, Turner's defensive efficiency in the playoffs has dropped significantly, showing an obvious state of strong offense and weak defense.

On the offensive end, Turner's help to the team mainly includes better assist rate and assist-loss ratio, as well as higher true shooting rate and backcourt rebound rate. As a reliable shooting insider, Turner can indeed create breakthrough space for Nembhard and Sika who are not good at three-pointers. This is his greatest value to the team.

But at the same time, we should note that Turner's net efficiency in the 25th season playoffs was only 4.1, which was the player with the lowest net efficiency among the starting five. This shows that compared to the other four, his importance does not seem to be very high. In fact, Hufu, signed by the Pacers in the offseason, is also a high-quality space center with excellent three-point frequency and accuracy. He has the opportunity to achieve Turner's effect on the offensive end, but on the defensive end, Hufu's reliability is much worse than Turner. Fortunately, the Pacers can still trade away highly talented players such as Marceline who are not compatible with the team's system in exchange for high-quality centers from other teams. As long as the backbone Haliburton can come back healthy, the team's competitiveness will still be very strong!

The model predicts that the Pacers will still win 39 games and finish ninth in the Eastern Conference next season. Although many people think that the Pacers' initiative to squander and get a high first-round pick is the best choice next season, but the Pacers are a team that never squanders in terms of team culture, so competing for the playoffs will still be the team's main theme in the new season. Next, we will focus on observing the growth and progress of the team's core rotation players and the center position, and wait for the commander to return from injury. Although they experienced setbacks in the offseason, as long as their core members remain healthy, the Pacers are still a promising Eastern Conference team~~