Score One for the Pacers, Bucks Defeat Injury-Depleted Bulls

In a matchup for the NBA East’s two top teams, the Indiana Pacers (19-3) came out the winner on Tuesday night with a 90-84 victory over the Miami Heat (16-6). It didn’t come easily for the Pacers as they had to overcome a deficit in the second half.

Let’s just say the Pacers wanted a win pretty badly. The memory of Game 7 from the Eastern Conference finals still stings and early in this season, David West said of the team’s goals for the season via NBC Sports, “We believe in this locker room that we can get the No. 1 seed and we started the year with that attitude. The fact that Game 7 of the conference finals wasn’t in our home building we felt was the difference in a trip to the Finals, and we’re going to do everything in our power to get a Game 7 in our building. And we have to start from the beginning of the season.”

Score 1 for the Pacers.

Paul George

After slow first-quarter starts, the night belonged to Roy Hibbert, who scored 24 points (15 shots), and Paul George with his 15 second-half points, including two key three pointers. For the night, George, who sits as the league’s No. 4 scorer, had 17 points, three rebounds and four assists. He said of the game via the Associated Press, “It was fun, a real intense game. Both teams were playing at a high level. You could see an urgency to win this game tonight.”

The Pacers now have a 10-0 home record and sit three games ahead of the Heat. Tuesday’s game is just one of many matchups for these two this season. They’ll meet again next week in Miami (Dec. 18) but after that, not again until March 26. How will the teams evolve in between the two games?

For now, the Heat sit at 19/10 to win the 2014 NBA Championship and the Pacers are 4/1.

The Heat will need to take things up a notch as they’ve now had three losses over the last fives games. This comes after 10 straight wins before their recent road trip.

In Tuesday’s matchup, LeBron James, the NBA’s second-best scorer, had 17 points (3 of 11 from the field), 14 rebounds and six assists. In the game’s last 36 minutes, he only scored nine points. Dwyane Wade had 17 points with Chris Bosh adding 12 points.

Overall, Miami shot just 42.9 percent from the field and went 4 of 21 for three pointers. In the game’s last three quarters, they only scored 54 points to end this disappointing road trip.

James said of their recent play after Tuesday’s loss via ESPN, “We came out with a mindset that we wanted to get a win to end this road trip the right way, end it over .500.We had our chances, and we just didn’t capitalize the best way we could.”

So what’s next for these two teams?

On Friday, the Pacers will play the Charlotte Bobcats (10-11). Danny Granger, who has been out all season, has said “there’s a very good chance” he’ll return for this game. Meanwhile the Heat will play the Cleveland Cavaliers (8-13) on Saturday.

In other NBA East news….

On Tuesday in a battle of two injury-depleted teams, the Chicago Bulls (8-11) lost to the lowly Milwaukee Bucks (5-16), 78-74.

John Henson

Bucks sophomore John Henson was on fire as he scored 25 points with 14 rebounds and six blocked shots. He was key to the win as he helped the team extend its lead with about a minute remaining.

Henson said of the game via the Associated Press, “We just kept fighting. Man, we just kept fighting. As a young team, a scrappy team out here, that’s what we got to do.”

For the night,  the Bucks used an eight-man rotation,while the Bulls utilized nine players.

On Wednesday, the Bulls will play the New York Knicks (5-15) while Bucks will play San Antonio (16-4) and get a loss (-11, 193 o/u).