On Wednesday night, LeBron James once again crushed the hearts of Pacers supporters.
Despite only scoring 13 points on Wednesday, the NBA’s all-time top scorer ended the Pacers’ five-game winning streak at a wild Gainbridge Fieldhouse with a tip-in at the buzzer to give the Lakers a 120-119 victory.
With 42 seconds remaining and leading 119-118, the Pacers decided to replace Tyrese Haliburton with Jarace Walker for defensive reasons. With 33 seconds remaining, Walker secured the defensive rebound after forcing Dorian Finney-Smith to miss.
However, Rick Carlisle decided to let his team finish the game rather than taking a timeout to get Haliburton, who had 18 assists, back on the floor.
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With 11 seconds remaining and the shot clock winding down, Bennedict Mathurin missed a crazy 3-point try. Luka Doncic missed a runner in the lane, but James was there to tip in the game-winning basket as the Lakers grabbed the rebound.
Carlisle was questioned about his choice to forego calling a timeout after the game.
“I thought about it,” he said. “Given the outcome, it would have been the right thing to do, looking back. However, the gap was nine or ten seconds. They most likely would have rushed it back at us if we had scored. I chose to stick with that group as they had a strong fourth-round run. However, I made that choice. We had to give a foul, which was another important component. We discussed it in the huddle. We simply didn’t do it, even if everyone on the sidelines was shouting it. We didn’t get a body on LeBron after they were let loose for a shot.
Haliburton was at the scorer’s table, but he had to watch the last seconds from the sidelines because there was no timeout or foul to halt play.
“I’m sure if we can have it back, we probably want to call a timeout there,” he stated.