Pistons Back in Driver’s Seat

Back home again for what Reggie Miller called the biggest game in franchise history -- on the same day as the Indianapolis 500, no less -- the Indiana Pacers had hoped to seize the wheel in the Eastern Conference finals.

But the Detroit Pistons, behind a commanding performance by Richard Hamilton, sent the series careening in a wildly different direction Sunday night in Game 5, running down the Pacers’ expectations and moving to within one victory of the NBA Finals.

Hamilton scored a playoff career-high 33 points and the Pistons, hoping to reach the Finals for the first time since 1990, never trailed in an 83-65 rout in front of 18,345 in Conseco Fieldhouse.

They lead the series, three games to two, and can end it with a victory Tuesday night at Auburn Hills, Mich. And the odds are decidedly in their favor: Of the previous 119 best-of-seven NBA playoff series that were tied after four games, the winner of Game 5 went on to win the series 83% of the time.

The Pacers, whose 61-21 regular-season record was the NBA’s best, seemed to have saved themselves from an inglorious playoff exit Friday night with an 83-68 Game 4 victory that restored their home-court advantage.

But the resilient Pistons, taking advantage of a punchless effort by the home team and a knee injury that slowed All-Star Pacer forward Jermaine O’Neal, responded with a rout of their own. They held the Pacers to a franchise playoff-low point total and 32.9% shooting. The Pacers, after making six of their first 10 shots, made only 28.8% the rest of the way.

“Tough night, from start to finish,” Pacer Coach Rick Carlisle said. “Looking at the stat sheet, I’ve got to say that I’ve kind of got to take the blame for this one. I just didn’t have these guys ready to play this type of game.”

While crediting the Pistons for “playing great from start to finish,” Carlisle continued: “I’m really disappointed in myself that I didn’t have these guys really convinced that, as well as we played Friday, as unselfishly as we played Friday, we were going to have to play even more unselfishly.

“And as hard as we played Friday, we were going to have to play even harder to match the kind of effort they were going to come in here with.”

They didn’t come close, not with O’Neal managing only 11 points in 38 minutes.

Four times they tied the score, the last three times in the second quarter, when Hamilton answered each time with a basket to put the Pistons back on top.

Hamilton, who made 12 of 22 shots, scored 15 of the Pistons’ last 18 points in the first half, helping them to a 41-36 halftime lead, then scored 11 in the third quarter as their advantage grew to 15 points.

In the fourth quarter, Rasheed Wallace scored eight of his 22 points, including two free throws to start an 8-0 Piston run after the Pacers had closed to within 64-59, before Hamilton put them over the top with a three-point basket.

“I love these situations,” Hamilton said. “I love playoffs, I love postseason; I loved it since college. I didn’t have a chance to play [in the playoffs] when I was in Washington, but just watching I licked my chops over it.

“And once I got here [after a trade], being in a good position and getting an opportunity to play in the postseason, I just excel at it.”

He has averaged 21.5 points in the playoffs after averaging 17.6 in the regular season, when he scored as many as 30 only once, a career-high 44-point effort against Cleveland.

Carlisle, who coached the Pistons to the Eastern Conference finals last season before they fired him last summer, had seen it before.

“The guy we really had no answer for was Hamilton,” the coach said late Sunday. “He just had a sensational game. We threw a lot of guys at him and he was just that good tonight, and I know how good he is because he was a big-time clutch playoff player for us last year. And he’s showing it again this year.”

Much to the Pacers’ distress.