Insider: With play-in hopes all but dashed, Pacers turn focus to youth

INDIANAPOLIS -- The declaration of the definitive end of the Indiana Pacers' intention to contend for a postseason berth in the 2022-23 season came in Rick Carlisle's pregame press conference Monday.

It's been clear since the trade deadline on Feb. 9 that the Pacers didn't consider a playoff berth to be an organizational imperative with their team so young, especially once it became clear that their best-case scenario would be a berth in the play-in round.

President of basketball operations Kevin Pritchard said as much at the time, noting it would be foolish to give up anything of value to guarantee one all-or-nothing game. He made pushes for players who could help the Pacers for multiple seasons, he said, but ended up only taking from the Milwaukee Bucks what they were willing to part with for virtually nothing.

At least until Monday, though, the Pacers still took wins as they came and considered going toe-to-toe with established teams to be something valuable for the development of their young roster. They used a two-game series against lottery-bound Detroit on March 11 and 13 as an opportunity to rest veterans, but followed a 1-1 split with the Pistons with a road win over the first-place Bucks, then beat the Raptors on the road a week later.

But at the end of that press conference Monday, Carlisle acknowledged that All-Star point guard Tyrese Haliburton and center Myles Turner, the team's second-leading scorer, would be sitting out for injury management reasons. Also, veteran guard Buddy Hield had been deemed by a team doctor to be too sick with a non-COVID illness to be in the building, forcing him to miss his first game of the season. With their top three scorers out, they would be playing a Dallas Mavericks team that includes two of the NBA's best guards in Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving and a team desperate to make a push for some kind of playoff run, sitting in 11th place in the West just a half-game behind the Thunder for 10th. Predictably, the Mavericks hammered the Pacers 127-104, snapping Dallas' four-game losing streak and giving the Pacers their third straight loss.

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"They got going and they got some real firepower," Carlisle said. "We just needed to have more resistance."

The Pacers could have obviously provided more resistance if Haliburton and Turner had played. Those two combined for 56 points in a win over the Mavericks in Dallas less than a month ago, and considering both were effective in games this past weekend, it appears they would have been fine to play in a game deemed important. However, Indiana has reached the point now that the math suggests it's no longer worth it for players to risk anything at all for victories this season. With the loss, the Pacers are 33-43, 3 1/2 games back of the Bulls (36-39) for 10th place in the Eastern Conference and the final slot in the play-in round with six games remaining on the Pacers' schedule and seven games remaining on the Bulls'. They aren't mathematically eliminated yet, but the odds are long.

The play-in experience could have been valuable but at this point the pursuit doesn't seem to be worth the potential drop in draft lottery position. If the season ended today, the Pacers would have the seventh-best odds of winning the draft lottery and would be set up to get the seventh pick in the draft. That could easily improve, however, if the Magic and Trail Blazers, both 32-43, win a few more games. With the seventh-worst record, the Pacers have a 7.5% chance at winning the No. 1 pick in the lottery and a 31.9% chance of earning any of the top four picks. If they move up to fifth, those numbers increase to 9.8% and 39.9%. And, of course, the higher up they are on the lottery board, the higher pick they get even if none of their ping-pong balls get selected.

That's not to say the Pacers will shut Turner down or that they won't play Haliburton again this season. Haliburton is the most important piece of the Pacers' rebuild and the more time each player gets to work with him, the better. It also doesn't mean the Pacers are entirely through winning games in 2022-23.

That said, Carlisle suggested Monday that what he's most interested in in the final stretch is throwing some young players in the deep end of the pool and forcing them to swim. On Monday, he started an entire lineup of players under the age of 24. All five of them had started games this season. Point guard Andrew Nembhard and forward Aaron Nesmith have been starters since mid-December. Center Jalen Smith got 28 starts mostly before mid-December, rookie Bennedict Mathurin has earned 10 starts and served as the sixth man for most of the season and forward Jordan Nwora has been granted lots of freedom and playing time since being acquired from the Bucks in February. However, they have rarely had the opportunity to work together and certainly not as starters.

"You're sitting at the grown-ups table when you get put in this position," Carlisle said, "and when you learn what it's like to carry this kind of load."

Carlisle wants more players to have a sense of what it really means to start an NBA game, to be on the floor with the other team's best players an have to hold your own. Haliburton, Hield and Turner have tons of experience in that area. With results less and less meaningful now, he wants to send more players into the offseason with that understanding.

"Starting sounds great," Carlisle said. "But I think a lot of young players look at starting as just an opportunity to get their offensive game going earlier in the game. That's not what being a winning two-way player is all about. Being a winning player is about taking on the challenge of a defensive matchup, playing within the defensive system, then offensively doing your job within the system."

Of all the players getting expanded opportunity, Carlisle seems most focused on getting that message across to Mathurin.

By almost every measure, Mathurin's rookie year has been a smashing success. The No. 6 overall pick in the 2022 draft out of Arizona has scored 1,180 points this season, the fourth-highest figure by any Pacers rookie in their NBA history. With two 3-pointers Monday, he matched Pacers guard Chris Duarte's rookie franchise record of 94 for a season. His 16.4 points per game put him second among all of the NBA's rookies this season behind only No. 1 pick and presumptive Rookie of the Year Paolo Banchero of the Magic.

But Carlisle kept Mathurin in the sixth man role for most of the season even as he promoted fellow rookie Andrew Nembhard into the starting five. Even though Nembhard didn't have Mathurin's scoring punch, he was a solid ball-handler and much stronger on defense, where Mathurin struggles. Mathurin had to start a few times because injuries, but Carlisle kept moving him back to the bench where he was statistically much more successful.

But at this point, he wants to force Mathurin into more uncomfortable situations and let him work his way through them. He's not putting Mathurin on opponent's best players, but just putting him on starters makes for a tougher assignment than he has been getting and it puts in sharp relief how devastating even small mistakes can be for a team.

"It's not about whether Benn Mathurin can go out and score points," Carlisle said. "He's gotta learn about the responsibility of being a starter, guarding a top player and carrying a scoring load and what it means to do both. The first 65 games of the season weren't like that. He was coming off the bench playing against a lot of second-unit guys and this is different. This is a great opportunity for him."

Mathurin started on Friday and Saturday with Hield moving to the bench for the first time all season and Mathurin struggled with the dual responsibilities. He found himself losing matchups when guarding top players in switches -- Boston's Jayson Tatum embarrassed him a few times Friday -- and he seemed to lose confidence on the offensive end. Against the Hawks and Celtics he scored a combined six points on 3 of 8 shooting.

But Monday he seemed to at least be back to his old self offensively. He led the Pacers with 26 points on 9 of 19 shooting, hitting a pair of 3-pointers and 6 of 7 free throw attempts.

"I feel like tonight my teammates were able to find me, just gave me the ball and I was able to create plays," Mathurin said. "I'm trying to involve my teammates a little more. I consider myself a scorer. I'm just looking forward to helping my teammates, trying to find them and making the game a little bit easier for them."

On defense, he was still reminded of how far he needs to go as an on-ball defender but even more so as an off-ball one. Nembhard and Nesmith guarded Irving and Doncic respectively, but Mathurin found himself on established pro wings Tim Hardaway Jr. and Reggie Bullock and lost some of those battles. He also gave up buckets, especially to Bullock, because he got sucked into the lane, lost site of his man and wasn't anywhere close to giving an effective closeout when the ball swing over to him. Bullock scored 11 points and knocked down 3 of 6 3-pointers in large part because Mathurin left him open and didn't recover in time.

"Being on the ball has always been one of my strengths," Mathurin said. "I've been trying to play off the ball a little bit more and just be more vocal and be a better defender. ... I have a tendency of worrying about my guy a little more. I have to trust my teammates a little more and see the floor a little bit wider."

It isn't just an adjustment for Mathurin of course. Nembhard has started 57 games this season, but just 15 at point guard with Haliburton out. Though he was a point guard his whole career before being drafted, including at Florida and Gonzaga, running an NBA offense is still an adjustment and he's making strides there. Nesmith is still in his first year of taking on top defensive assignments. Nwora is getting much more freedom to create and score after getting limited playing time with the Bucks. Smith got almost all of his starts earlier this season at power forward and has different responsibilities at center.

"I think this was a good learning experience and a good opportunity for guys to keep getting better," Nembhard said. "That's what we're trying to do right now."

The pursuit of development for those young players means the Pacers aren't playing their best lineups, which makes it extremely hard to beat teams that need victories. Almost all of the Pacers' remaining games are against such teams. The Bucks, their opponent in Wednesday's game, are shooting for the top seed in the East and the best record in the NBA, which would mean home court advantage throughout the playoffs. On Friday they get the Oklahoma City Thunder, who along with the Mavericks are part of a wild, wide open race for playoff positioning in the Western Conference. In the season's final week, they play the fourth-place Cleveland Cavaliers on the road Sunday and the fifth place New York Knicks twice, once at home on April 5 and once at Madison Square Garden on Easter. They play the Pistons on April 7, and that's the only remaining opponent out of postseason contention.

The Pacers could end up in several more blowouts like the one they suffered Monday, but that could be the best thing for their purposes in the long run.

"This is all valuable, even the painful stuff," Carlisle said. "A lot of times the painful stuff is the stuff that stimulates growth."