The Indiana Pacers are falling apart at the worst time

A promising start for the Indiana Pacers has been eroded by regression and an ugly slide since the return of Victor Oladipo.

What looked like a promising, momentum building season for the Indiana Pacers has begun to come apart at the seams. Indiana has lost seven of their last 10, currently camped on the No. 6 seed in the Eastern Conference. Their recent skid has dovetailed, unfortunately, with the return of Victor Oladipo but his personal struggles are just a piece of the puzzle. Since Jan. 29, his first game of the season, Indiana has been outscored by 5.6 points per 100 possessions with him on the floor and 7.0 points per 100 possessions with him on the bench.

Oladipo is nursing an injured back and now depth could become more of a problem with news that Jeremy Lamb‘s knee injury is extremely serious and will end his season.

Things would be much easier if the Pacers could count on Oladipo being even a limited version of what he had been the past two seasons. But in his scant minutes since returning he’s shooting under 30 percent on 3-pointers and just a hair over 40 percent from inside the arc. It was expected that Oladipo would need some time to work his way back after missing almost a year rehabbing from a torn quad tendon. But even if his wonky back stops bothering him, it’s hard to imagine him bring a game-changer in time for a deep playoff run.

As Caitlin Cooper pointed out at Indy Cornrows, Oladipo’s issues are mostly showing up on his drives to the basket and finishing, as he relearns how to trust his leg leaping in traffic:

"Where he once would’ve hit the brakes at a moment’s notice and propelled himself straight up and down for a pull-up jump shot, he’s snaking his way around traffic and landing softly on one leg. Rather than getting all the way to the basket and attempting an on-point layup, he’s settling for floaters and off-balance finishes while only sparsely getting to the line."

That issue, in particular, becomes more problematic without Lamb who has been one of the team’s most effective off-the-dribble creators, particularly when the ball is swung his direction against a shifted defense and he can act as a secondary threat. Lamb was fifth on the team in drives per game, but shooting 52.8 percent off those drives and posting a points-per-drive mark (0.716) well above that of the team’s more frequent drivers, like T.J. McConnell (0.428), Malcolm Brogdon (0.463) and Aaron Holiday (0.444).

Lamb was also very important to the Pacers’ spacing as a catch-and-shoot threat, knocking down 38.5 percent of his catch-and-shoot 3s before this knee injury. Hitting open jumpers has been a problem, in general, for Indiana over the past few weeks — they’ve made just 30.5 percent of their catch-and-shoot 3s since Oladipo returned. But they’re also creating about one less catch-and-shoot attempt per game over that span, indicative of a suddenly purposeless offense that is passing way more (317.1 per game compared to 293.2) but creating essentially the same number of potential assists. Their average offensive possession is about a half-second longer — roughly the difference between being the 18th-fastest and the 26th-fastest on the season. They are taking longer and accomplishing less.

Seeing the Pacers reach their preseason ceiling without Lamb and with a limited Oladipo means T.J. Warren will have to take his career-year to another level, Holiday takes a leap and Brogdon returns to the fringe All-NBA level he was playing at in the first few weeks of the season. It’s a tall order any way you cut it.

In the grand scheme of things, the difference in hypothetical outcomes for Indiana may only be downgrading a second-round playoff loss to a first-round playoff exit — it would have taken a miraculous run for this team to really puss for a Finals berth. But for an organization that should be measuring success by growth, momentum and building excitement and positive vibes with the fanbase, a late-season backslide is still a pretty big deal.