OKLAHOMA CITY — Sport 5 of the NBA Finals was beginning to seem like Sport 1 over again. The Oklahoma City Thunder took an enormous lead at residence. The Indiana Pacers got here roaring again within the fourth quarter.
Indiana received that one.
This time, the Thunder crafted a unique ending — and a 3-2 lead within the Finals was their reward.
Jalen Williams scored a career-playoff-high 40 factors, MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander added 31 and the Thunder moved one win from a title by beating the Pacers 120-109 on Monday night time.
“We’re studying,” stated Williams, whose earlier playoff finest was 34.
It was the tenth — and by far, the most important — time the Thunder stars mixed for greater than 70 factors in a sport. Williams was 14-of-24 from the sector, and Gilgeous-Alexander added 10 assists. The pair mixed to attain or help on 103 factors, essentially the most by a duo in an NBA Finals sport previously 50 years, in response to ESPN Analysis.
“It wasn’t an ideal sport in any respect, and there is numerous room for progress,” Thunder coach Mark Daigneault stated. “However our enchancment from Sport 4 to Sport 5 was essential.”
Pascal Siakam had 28 factors for Indiana, which is able to host Sport 6 on Thursday night time. TJ McConnell added 18 for the Pacers, who whittled an 18-point deficit down to 2 within the fourth — then watched the Thunder draw back once more, and for good.
“It form of went away from us,” Siakam stated. “However the battle was there.”
It was, however now the whole lot favors the Thunder.
Groups that win Sport 5 of an NBA Finals that was tied at 2-2 have gone on to win the collection 23 instances in 31 earlier alternatives, or 74%. And groups with a 3-2 lead within the finals have received 40 instances in 49 earlier alternatives, or 82%.
However Sport 5 was not straightforward. Removed from it.
Down by 18 late within the second quarter, the Pacers — the comeback kings of those playoffs, with as many wins on this postseason from 15 factors down or extra (5) than the remainder of the league has mixed, together with in Sport 1 of this collection — did what they do, chipping away. And so they did it with Tyrese Haliburton decreased to mainly enjoying decoy on offense due to a leg concern that he aggravated within the first quarter.
“He isn’t 100%,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle stated. “It is fairly clear.”
Led by McConnell, who scored 13 factors in just below seven minutes of the third, the Pacers acquired inside 5 late in that quarter.
Then, Siakam went to work — a pair of free throws with 9:19 left acquired Indiana inside 4, then a 3-pointer a few minute later made it 95-93. Within the play-by-play period of the NBA, beginning with the 1997 playoffs, groups with leads of 15 factors or extra within the Finals had been 80-9.
Make that 81-9 now, and the Thunder are one win away from giving Oklahoma Metropolis its first NBA title.
“That was actually the identical actual sport as Sport 1,” Williams stated. “Studying by these finals, that is what makes a workforce good.”
Yet another win, and his workforce might be licensed as nice.
The Related Press contributed to this story.