INDIANAPOLIS — A no-look pass from Tyrese Haliburton and a ferocious dunk from Pascal Siakam left the home crowd in a frenzy with less than a minute remaining in the first half of Game 6 of the NBA Finals, and the Indiana Pacers rode that wave to a dominant 108-91 victory over the Oklahoma City Thunder on Thursday night to force a winner-take-all Game 7.
Haliburton stole a pass from Jalen Williams, tiptoed on the sideline to remain inbounds and led a fast break before dishing a no-look pass into the hands of Siakam, who slammed the ball home as the fans at Gainbridge Fieldhouse roared.
“That’s a special moment,” Haliburton said, “especially because we are always getting on Pascal for not dunking anymore.”
The dunk gave Indiana a 20-point lead, and Oklahoma City never recovered.
The first NBA Finals Game 7 since 2016 will take place Sunday night in Oklahoma City.
“Honestly, me and Pascal have not spoken about this play yet,” Haliburton said. “I don’t know if we will until this is over. … If we are fortunate enough to go on and win this thing, I think that play will be remembered for a long time.”
That matched the mindset of the Pacers after their victory Thursday night. Although they played perhaps their most complete game of this improbable playoff run, they were in no mood to celebrate.
“We’ve got one game,” Haliburton said. “One game. Nothing that’s happened before matters. And nothing that’s going to happen after matters.”
Indiana actually started the game slowly, missing its first eight shots to fall behind 10-2. But the Pacers rallied to dominate the turnover battle 21-11 and held the Thunder to 91 points, their fewest in any game since April 2022, by blitzing Oklahoma City with contributions from up and down the roster.
Obi Toppin came off the bench to be the Pacers’ leading scorer with 20 points. Andrew Nembhard added 17, and Siakam had 16 points and 13 rebounds.
“We are just super resilient, and we’re hungry,” Toppin said. “We all work extremely hard every single day to allow the success that we had, and we’re not done.”
Haliburton, who had been a game-time decision leading up to Game 6 because of a strained right calf, proved his resilience with Thursday night’s performance. He received a wide range of treatment to get ready to play, including hyperbaric chambers, needles, massages, electronic stimulation and a compression sleeve on his calf.
He said there was little doubt in his mind that he would play.
“I just look at it as I want to be out there to compete with my brothers,” said Haliburton, who finished with 14 points and five assists in 23 minutes. “These are guys that I’m willing to go to war with. We’ve had such a special year. We have a special bond as a group. I’d beat myself up if I didn’t give it a chance.”
Haliburton said he told coach Rick Carlisle to pull him from the game if he didn’t look like himself on the floor. But there was no need, and Haliburton’s contributions helped the Pacers pick up another victory to save their season.
“He’s super important to us,” Carlisle said. “The big thing was just there wasn’t a lot of drama. … He was straightforward. He didn’t want a lot of attention. He was doing everything possible to be able to play.”
Still, in the aftermath of their victory, Haliburton cautioned his team not to follow the “narratives” heading into Game 7.
“The narratives are going to be almost poison,” Haliburton said. “To talk about what this would mean to our city and our organization and legacy talk, and we played so well and now the pressure is on [the Thunder] … there’s going to be narratives that we can’t really pay attention to.
“We’ve got to control what we can. So much of these games has come down to who is going to start the fight from a physicality standpoint, take care of the ball better and rebound the ball better. Those are the important things that we need to focus on. I don’t even want to say, celebrate this one tonight and move on. It’s done with. We did our job to take care of home court, and we have to be ready to compete in Game 7.”
