Indiana coach Rick Carlisle put it best in summing up his team’s finishing punch in the Eastern Conference semifinals.
“The winning team writes the script,” he said.
The Pacers’ 114-105 victory over the Cavaliers in Game 5 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 said. “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 31 points and Pascal Siakam added 21 as the Pacers reached the conference finals in consecutive years for the first time since 2013-14.
Donovan Mitchell, who missed the second half of Sunday´s game due to a sprained left ankle, led Cleveland with 35 points. Evan Mobley added 24 points and 11 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 game. The lowest point spread was 5½. That was something that fueled our guys, too,” Carlisle said.
The fourth-seeded Pacers will now await the winner of the matchup between the Boston Celtics and New York Knicks. New York leads 3-1 with Game 5 on Wednesday night in Boston.
Indiana rallied from a 19-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 2005 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 0-3 at home. We let the city down,” Mitchell said. “This place is special. What hurts is that we didn´t get it done at home.”
Cleveland stormed out to a 44-25 lead with 8:10 remaining in the second quarter, but Haliburton had five of his six 3-pointers in the period as the Pacers got within 56-52 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 said.
Indiana then shot 14 of 22 from the field in the third quarter, when it had a 17-2 run, to go up 85-76 going into the final 12 minutes.
The Cavs shot 38.9% for the game and were a woeful 9 of 35 on 3-pointers. Mitchell and Darius Garland were a combined 12 of 41, including 4 of 19 from beyond the arc.
Mitchell´s 3-pointer got the Cavs within 106-103 with 1:27 remaining, but Indiana closed it out by scoring eight of the final 10 points.