With frontcourt short-handed and Tyrese Haliburton limited, Pacers fall to Kings

INDIANAPOLIS -- With their top two centers out with injuries and their All-Star point guard still on a minutes restriction, the Pacers made some moves with their lineups but still lost 133-122 to the Kings on Friday night at Gainbridge Fieldhouse, suffering their third straight loss.

The Pacers fell to 27-23 and their lead over the Heat for sixth place in the Eastern Conference shrunk to a 1/2 game. The Kings improved to 28-19 and sit at fifth in the West.

Here are four observations.

Pacers start strong with new lineup but fade and struggle to defend

The absence of centers Myles Turner and Jalen Smith due to injury and the minutes restriction on Tyrese Haliburton forced Pacers coach Rick Carlisle to get creative with lineups. T.J. McConnell started at point guard as the Pacers finally got Haliburton some work in the fourth quarter despite his minutes restriction due to a hamstring injury. Isaiah Jackson started at center, but the Pacers had to play a number of lineups without a true center, trying to instead counter by using three players who have started at power forward at some point this season in Pascal Siakam, Obi Toppin and Aaron Nesmith.

The shuffled lineup started extremely strong on offense, scoring 39 points in the first period on 17 of 24 shooting, including 4 of 6 from 3-point range with 1.51 points per possession. The Pacers posted 10 assists on those field goals and had 20 points in the paint showing excellent ball movement.

The Pacers struggled to get stops even in that quarter, though, allowing the Kings to put 38 on the board on 16 of 24 shooting for 1.37 points per possession. Through the game, the offensive potency faded and the Pacers still struggled to stop the Kings. The Pacers were held to 49 points in the middle two quarters before scoring 34 in the fourth and shot 53.5% from the floor, posting a mediocre 1.11 points per possession in large part because of 21 turnovers.

"A lot of them were probably unforced," said Siakam, who had four turnovers himself. "There were a couple there that you could argue whether it was a foul or not when you're trying to drive or you get hit or whatever. I felt like most of it was unforced just throwing it to them basically. It's something that we can control and I think we can rectify. I had four or five turnovers. That's not me. I've gotta be better at understanding where the guys are and when to pass or not."

Sacramento shot 56.7% from the floor with six players in double figures. Former Pacer center Domantas Sabonis scored 26 on 9 of 14 shooting to go with 12 rebounds, guard De'Aaron Fox had 25, guard Malik Monk had 23 and forward Harrison Barnes had 22. Guard Kevin Huerter added 15 and former Aresnal Tech star Trey Lyles added 13 on 3 of 4 3-pointers.

"I thought our guys gave it a great effort," Carlisle said. "Difficult situation, guarding a guy like Sabonis who should be an All-Star. This guy had 16, 18 rebounds the other night, 26 last week. He's just a beast. They're rested, we're not, there's a lot of things going against us. Guys fought through the end. It's a tough night. ... We needed to do a lot of things better. We didn't. We gotta fix it."

With switched up minutes, Tyrese Haliburton gets in for the fourth

After following the exact same pattern with his minutes restriction on Tuesday and Thursday, the Pacers switched things up on Friday and brought Haliburton off the bench to start the game for the first time since his rookie year when he was playing for the Kings.

Carlisle said the decision was made to make the shift after a discussion with Haliburton on Thursday night.

"He was in favor of having the ability to finish the game," Carlisle said. "The first two games, typically in those situations when there's an injury and a significant amount of time, you want to take a player from warm-ups to starting to short intervals of rest to keep him warm, then when you get into the minutes threshold, you shut down and that's it. The first two games, that made sense. It was decided on by medical staff, Tyrese, the coaching staff. Tonight it was a shift."

Haliburton sat out the entire first quarter. He didn't sit on the bench at all, instead working out away from the floor and then on a stationary bike in the tunnel before he took the floor to start the second quarter.

The switch allowed Haliburton to get some time in the fourth quarter for the first time since his first attempt at a comeback on Jan. 19 against the Blazers, though he actually played a little less Friday than he did Tuesday or Thursday, finishing with 21 minutes, 32 seconds. He played more than eight minutes each in the second and third, but just 4:56 in the fourth period. Though he hoped to finish the game, he came out with 3:04 to go because the Pacers were down 15 points at that point -- and they would be down 16 after Domantas Sabonis hit the second of two free throws -- and the lead seemed insurmountable at that point.

Haliburton continued to show some progress in his recovery from a hamstring strain, though he admittedly didn't play well. He scored 14 points on 6 of 10 shooting including 1 of 3 from 3-point range, but he registered just one assist against five turnovers, and the Pacers were -15 when he was on the floor. He said he didn't blame the minutes restriction for his performance.

"I'm not going to use that as an excuse, I just had a poor game," Haliburton said. "It comes with the territory. It happens through the course of 82. You learn from it and move on. I just had to do a better job of taking care of the ball. That was the biggest thing. Usually, it makes sense, we have a lot of assists when I have a lot of assists and we have a lot of turnovers when I have a lot of turnovers."

T.J. McConnell brings energy in return

Veteran point guard T.J. McConnell had a fairly miserable week up until Friday. He missed Sunday's game against the Grizzlies because one of his kids was sick. He practiced Monday in hopes he wouldn't pick up an illness himself but did after he got to Boston with the team and he not only didn't play in Tuesday's game against the Celtics, he stayed in his hotel room and left for New York after the team did as he waited for it to clear up. He was available Thursday but didn't play.

Friday he got back on the floor and started in Haliburton's place, and brought the energy he traditionally does, attacking the rim, going after ball-handlers and creating for teammates. He posted nine points on 3 of 5 shooting, dished out seven assists, grabbed three rebounds and two steals, and the Pacers were +1 when he was on the floor.

"He played well," Carlisle said. "He was I think the only guy on the roster that was a plus on the plus-minus side. He quarterbacked us to a one-point win in the first quarter. He came through it well. I'd say he's back into it."

Bennedict Mathurin, Buddy Hield switch places, both score

The move to bring Haliburton off the bench and start McConnell wasn't the only switch to the starting lineup. They also moved struggling guard Buddy Hield to the bench and put Bennedict Mathurin in the starting lineup after Mathurin had missed the last two games with a sprained right big toe.

The move seemed to suit both men well, at least with all lineups in flux on Friday night. Hield scored 17 points on 7 of 13 shooting including 3 of 8 from 3-point range. Mathurin scored 31 points on 10 of 14 shooting.

"He can score," Carlisle said of Mathurin. "He's a scorer. My job is to guide him to becoming a winning, championship player who can play with any group and find his opportunities to score the ball within the flow of the team. He was really important to us at the beginning of the night because we were struggling."

Carlisle was asked if the move to put Mathurin in the starting lineup was permanent. He said it was based on the idea that Mathurin was "fresh" after not having played the last two games and the fact that the Pacers had just played a road game the night before on a back-to-back, but also that Mathurin had played well enough to start.

"No, it's not permanent," Carlisle said. "Things are fluid. Starting's got to be merit-based. You don't just give a guy a starting position. Teams that do that in development go through terrible growing pains because guys are just given minutes. You got minutes, go figure it out, and the level of accountability is not there. We're not doing that. We're not doing that. I thought Benn earned this opportunity. I thought it made sense based on the fact that they were rested, we weren't."

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Pacers vs. Kings: With Myles Turner, Jalen Smith out, Pacers fall