Pacers eliminate top-seeded Cavaliers 114-105, advance to the Eastern Conference Finals

CLEVELAND AP Indiana coach Rick Carlisle put it best in summing up his crew s finishing punch in the Eastern Conference semifinals The winning unit writes the script he disclosed The Pacers - success over the Cavaliers in Tournament on Tuesday night was similar to the first two games of the series Cleveland jumped out to a big first-half lead but Indiana s quick tempo eventually took a toll I have to give our guys credit they earned this Carlisle explained This was one of the best teams in the league I m sorry their season had to end like this They had the perfect season and we came along and were hot at the right time Tyrese Haliburton scored points and Pascal Siakam added as the Pacers reached the conference finals in consecutive years for the first time since - Donovan Mitchell who missed the second half of Sunday s competition due to a sprained left ankle led Cleveland with points Evan Mobley added points and rebounds The top-seeded Cavs swept their first-round series against Miami but were unable to match up against the up-tempo Pacers We were not favored in one competition The lowest point spread was That was something that fueled our guys too Carlisle noted The fourth-seeded Pacers will now await the winner of the matchup between the Boston Celtics and New York Knicks New York leads - with Tournament on Wednesday night in Boston Indiana rallied from a -point deficit in the first half and took control after halftime and won all three games at Cleveland s Rocket Arena It was the first time since a first-round series against Boston that the Pacers won three road games in a playoff series The Cavs dropped three home games in a postseason series for the first time I love playing in this arena man We re - at home We let the city down Mitchell explained This place is special What hurts is that we didn t get it done at home Cleveland stormed out to a - lead with remaining in the second quarter but Haliburton had five of his six -pointers in the period as the Pacers got within - at halftime We didn t panic after that rough start to the first quarter We talked about how we knew that they were going to throw a haymaker there But I thought we weathered the storm the right way and got going from there Haliburton reported Indiana then shot of from the field in the third quarter when it had a - run to go up - going into the final minutes The Cavs shot for the event and were a woeful of on -pointers Mitchell and Darius Garland were a combined of including of from beyond the arc Mitchell s -pointer got the Cavs within - with remaining but Indiana closed it out by scoring eight of the final points AP NBA https apnews com nba Source