INDIANAPOLIS — Rick Carlisle’s directive had been as powerful as it was profane.
Go rebound the [expletive] ball.
His Pacers rebounded the [expletive] out of the ball, and beat the [redacted] out of the Knicks, 116-103, in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference semis before a sellout crowd of 17,274 at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.
“We needed it,” Aaron Nesmith said of Carlisle’s tough love. The team had to sit through an R-rated film session — ‘R’ for rebounding — and they responded.
Indiana lived to see Sunday’s do-or-die Game 7 at the Garden because it didn’t just hold its own on the boards, but battered the league’s rebounding bullies. After dropping several F-bombs over his team’s failings on the glass, Carlisle’s squad outrebounded the Knicks, 47-35, on Friday.
“We deserved every bit of it,” TJ McConnell said of the tongue-lashing they got in the film room. “After watching the [Game 5] film, it was kind of disgusting to see. You thought it was bad, but then when you re-watch it, it’s even worse. So we tried to flush that one and come out and have a concerted effort on things we need to be better at, and we did. And we just have to put the same kind of effort for a Game 7.
“Yeah, Game 5 was an embarrassment on all fronts from all of us. And just made a concerted effort, credit to Myles [Turner] and the bigs and just the entire group coming together and being mature about it and knowing what we need to fix and going out there and fix it.”
Indiana fixed a ton, flipping the script from its Game 5 humiliation.
The Pacers had been outrebounded 53-29, the gap on the offensive glass even more glaring at 20-5.
The rebounding margin had been laughable. Except the Pacers weren’t laughing, staring at elimination in Game 6.
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But they rebounded Friday, figuratively and literally.
“It was just activity. We played harder, which was a must,” Carlisle said. “We outrebounded them and that’s obviously a big key to the series.”
After being outscored 63-36 in the paint in Game 5, Indiana had a 62-38 edge Friday. This against a Knicks team that was first in the league in rebound percentage, third-best in the playoffs.
Turner had a team-high eight rebounds, and power forward Pascal Siakam added seven.
Every Indiana starter had at least six. The guards came down to crash, helping the big men in a total effort to fend off Knicks center Isaiah Hartenstein.
“They’re both aggression stats. We needed to do better in the aggression department,” said Carlisle. “Game 5 in New York was, I’d have to say, our lowest aggression game in the entire playoffs. So we didn’t have a very fun-filled film session [Thursday] watching it. But you go through these ups and downs, and young teams are going to grow. So we’ll find out how much on Sunday.”