RICK CARLISLE IS SO PROMINENT AS THE INDIANA COACH — THE KNICKS WILL CALL
No team is less suited to winning an NBA championship than the Pacers, and Carlisle is the primary reason for a 2-1 lead in the Finals, meaning New York has to reach out and hear yet another rejection
The phone should ring today, assuming it didn’t Wednesday night. Do not laugh if Rick Carlisle is the next coach contacted by the Knicks. Never mind that he has a 2-1 lead in the NBA Finals, all because he has commandeered the Indiana Pacers with his wondrous leadership abilities. The way they think in New York, why wouldn’t he drop his career and life and let another man finish off two more victories?
Truth is, Carlisle might be the smartest man in basketball and would be wiser to avoid Jim Dolan and Leon Rose than he was in escaping the Dallas Mavericks. There is no team, in my extended memory, that is less suited to winning a championship than the Pacers. The reason they lead the Oklahoma City Thunder is not Tyrese Haliburton or Bennedict Mathurin, who is part of a bench that showed up big in Game 3. The reason is Carlisle, who is at the top of his craft at 65 in his black leisure suit and bald head.
“This is the kind of team we are. We need everybody,” said Carlisle, whose team won the fourth quarter, 32-18, in a 116-107 victory over the league’s defensive masters. “It’s not always going to be exactly the same guys that are stepping up with scoring and stuff like that, but this is how we’ve got to do it. We’ve got to do it as a team.”
Oh, the Knicks are well aware. Would they be so insanely brash to make a call to his bosses, president Kevin Pritchard and general manager Chad Buchanan? They called the Mavericks, who refused to let Jason Kidd interview. They called the Houston Rockets, who refused to let Ime Udoka interview. They called the Minnesota Timberwolves, who said ditto about Chris Finch. They called the Atlanta Hawks, who said ditto about Quin Snyder. There are coaches who aren’t even liked by fans, such as Chicago’s Billy Donovan, who won’t be available for the Knickerbockers.
They fired Tom Thibodeau, ate at least $30 million on his contract and did not have a short list that made any sense. Jay Wright is the right idea but said he’s the wrong man, reportedly turning down interest though he coached Jalen Brunson, Josh Hart and Mikal Bridges at Villanova and is friendly with Rose, the president. The Knicks are obnoxious in preferring to invade other franchises. Wouldn’t the Pacers be next? “To the best city in the world with the best fans in the world: Thank you,” Thibodeau wrote this week in an advertisement in the New York Times. "When I was hired in 2020, I said this was my dream job. I am grateful that dream became a reality.”
The new reality is that Carlisle could become the seventh coach to win a title in the NBA’s last seven seasons. What is the quickest way to say no in New York? F— no. He can’t believe Thibodeau was dumped after the Pacers eliminated the Knicks. “I thought it was one of those fake AI things,” he said. “No way. There’s no way possible. I have great respect for Thibs. I was surprised. I always say shocked — sometimes you get numb and you’re not shocked.”
Carlisle blew out Thibodeau though his only tried-and-true star is Haliburton, who has emerged as a scoring outrage in the final five seconds of postseason games. As a teen in Wisconsin, he loved the Miami Heat and couldn’t stand Carlisle, coach of the Mavericks. Who won the Finals in 2011? Carlisle. “The fact I’m here with him is pretty full circle. I couldn’t stand him at the time,” Haliburton said. “I ask guys about the 2011 run all the time. They went into a lot of their playoff series the way we did, as an underdog. They had a f—k-it mentality, excuse my language. As long as guys here believe, anything is possible. No analyst or quote-unquote expert will pick us, and that’s fine.”
They pick them now, of course. Carlisle believed in his bench, including Mathurin, who scored 27 points. This came three nights after Shai Gilgeous-Alexander razzed the fellow Canadian, calling him “too small.” I wonder who scored only 24 in Game 3 — the league MVP. Mathurin is only the sixth player, at age 22 or younger, to score at least 25 in the Finals. “He did a great job of coming off handoffs, reading the pocket, rising up from the midrange,” Haliburton said. “This is a defense that will give that up.”
Whoa. The Thunder will give up the midrange shot? He also praised T.J. McConnell, who had five steals with his 10 points — a first in a Finals game. Anyone who notices the depth isn’t hesitant to predict two more wins. Gilgeous-Alexander might have to soar into the stratosphere if his bench can’t rise. “That's the great thing about the Finals, great thing about basketball,” Haliburton said. “When you have a team with this much depth, it can be anybody's night.”
It might have seemed strange when Carlisle left the Mavericks four years ago, after Donnie Nelson was fired as general manager. He took the Indiana job because he had issues — with the owner, Mark Cuban, and with the young superstar, Luka Doncic. In retrospect, might he have sensed that Cuban would lose his managing position after a sale and that Doncic would be traded in a bombshell to the Lakers? Carlisle hadn’t won a playoff series since winning the championship. It was time.
Imagine if he wins it all.
Armed with Haliburton, who arrived from Sacramento in a deal for Domantas Sabonis, Carlisle knew he needed bench requisites. “I’ve learned so much over the years about players that appear to have quirky elements to their game and the importance of looking at what they can do and not focusing on what they may not be able to do particularly well,” he said. “It was clear when we got Ty that we needed to surround him with shooting, with toughness and depth and resources.”
He also understands how to deal with Haliburton’s psyche. After fading out in a Game 2 loss, he walked out of a news conference with a limp. Would be be followed by day-to-day injury scrutiny? No, said Carlisle. “I know he has some discomfort. He feels it. But each day it's getting better. I don't think you're going to hear him making a big deal out of it,” he said. “This is the time of year where it just doesn't get any better than this. The atmosphere, the interest, the opportunity and being at home — I mean, there's just so much to be excited about. I don't think anything is going to keep these guys from playing in the game.”
Haliburton played and starred. He scored 22 points with 11 assists and 9 rebounds. He roared when necessary. He played to the crowd at Gainbridge Fieldhouse. Carlisle stood on the sideline and watched as the Pacers improved to 9-1 in clutch playoff games. With Game 4 arriving Friday night in Indianapolis, isn’t a 3-1 series lead on the horizon? “We just had a lot of unforced errors,” Thunder forward Jalen Williams said. “They capitalized on them because they’re a good team.”
“In the fourth quarter, I just thought they really outplayed us on both ends,” said Thunder coach Mark Daigneault, who is being schooled at 40. “I thought they were in character in terms of their physicality, their pressure on defense. Then they were in character in terms of their pace on offense.”
Said Chet Holmgren: “To win games of this magnitude, at this level, we have to be better. We need to close games, close quarters, close possessions. It doesn't just come down to the end of the game. We got to figure out how to put ourselves in a better position for the whole 48 minutes.”
So here is Rick Carlisle, taking over the Finals, as he has taken over the postseason. He is the reason NBA coaches never should be undermined, though so many are crushed. Frank Vogel won a title with the Lakers in 2020. Monty Williams made the Finals with the Suns in 2021. Mike Budenholzer won a title with the Bucks in 2021. Udoka made the Finals with the Celtics in 2022. Michael Malone won a title with the Nuggets in 2023.
All were dismissed.
The Knicks? “I mean, teams and ownership can make these decisions unilaterally,” said Carlisle, “and it’s their right to do that.”
He will be staying in Indianapolis. Bigger than Caitlin Clark? Bigger than Larry Bird? “In 49 states, it’s just basketball,” Carlisle said. “But this is Indiana.”
Give him a race car float at the parade.
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Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.