INDIANAPOLIS – The Indiana Pacers put in work on Friday night to increase their win streak to four games as they blasted the Detroit Pistons 125-88. They took care of business from the word go and never trailed a single second in this one. Darren Collison was literally unconscious and not missing a shot the entire game. Well…for the three quarters that he played. He went 7 for 7 from the field, 2 for 2 from behind the arc and 3 for 3 from the free throw line to finish with 19 points! That’s NUTS!!!
When I asked him how it felt to be unconscious he said, “Listen as long as you guys have known I always look to get other guys involved it just happened to be my night. If I go four points and 10 assists plus assists and we win that’s been my motto the whole entire year. It just happened tonight where the ball was finding me in the right places.”
The Pacers came out and went on an 8-0 run before Dwayne Casey called a timeout to calm things down. The Pistons scratched and clawed their way back into it to keep it close for a few minutes. However, by the end of the first quarter the Pacers were shooting 70 percent from the field to extend their lead to 32-21.
Indiana’s second unit came in and found their rhythm quickly as the Pistons seemed to lose their way on the floor. Before I could unwrap my hot dog they were up 44-30 with 6:37 left in the half. Domantas Sabonis came off of the bench and put up 11 of his 19 points.
Bojan Bogdanovic had already scored 10 of his 12 points and Myles Turner was just getting started as he scored 7 of his 17 points early on.
It wasn’t long before the Blue and Gold started to pull away taking advantage of transition buckets. Detroit committed 11 first half turnovers to help the Pacers get to the break 58-45.
The Pacers came out of the break and went on a 9-4 run to extend their lead to 67-49 before boyz could get back into their seats. Darren Collison put down a massive dunk, only his second since rejoining the Pacers, that blew the roof off of the joint and it was Chris Brown up in that piece from that point on. “On and Poppin’!”
Collison put in work in the third quarter as he was red hot hitting everything but kitchen sink.
At the end of three the Pacers had exploded to a 91-69 lead with boyz shooting 60 percent from the field. However, they struggled from behind the arc as a team only shooting 21 percent but it really didn’t matter. Three-point shots were not necessary in this one.
Nate McMillan’s goal is to have at least 25 assists and they blew that goal out of the water with 33!!!
Indiana had taken the life out of Detroit by midway through the third and it was a matter of formality in the fourth. Nate took his big guns out and rested them the rest of the way as the second and third units kept the Pistons at bay the rest of the way. Up next Atlanta on Monday