The Indiana Pacers have played 3 games since the All-Star break, with varying results. Let’s look at what’s going on.

The post-ASB period is often considered the second half of the season, much to my dismay. While it is closer to the final third, it is still the stretch run of the year, teams are buckling down and positioning themselves for the postseason. The Indiana Pacers are no exception.

They are dealing with some injuries and just added a player in Wesley Matthews. They are shaping up their rotation to have it perfected for the playoffs. For perhaps their most challenging hurdle, they have a pretty tough schedule coming up. The Pacers are going to have to play well the rest of the way.

In 3 games since the All-Star break, we have seen a mixed bag of results and indicators for how well the team will play throughout the homestretch. Let’s take a look back and see what we can draw from the trio of games, starting with some simple observations.

Wesley Matthews is just what the doctor ordered.

It’s cliche to say, but Matthews is fitting into the Pacers by standing out.

Matthews is huge for a 2 guard, and he’s an intelligent defender. In tandem, those skills let him lock down anyone. Last Saturday, he did a great job on Bradley Beal, particularly in the first half. He limited him to just 9 shot attempts in the first 24 minutes, and over half of them were from the mid-range, the shots they were encouraging him to take. Matthews can defend the other team’s star scorers effectively enough, and that is huge for the no-Oladipo team.

On offense, I was pretty meh on his fit, but that was due to my incorrect assumption that he would fit the team’s style and not vice-versa. The team has catered well to Matthews strengths, allowing him to chuck threes (his 70.8 percent three-point attempt rate is easily the highest on the roster) and back down smaller defenders. Matthews has been a beautiful fit so far.

Darren Collison is clutch.

Victor Oladipo used to take over game after game down the stretch. Without him, someone would have to step up at the end of games. Enter Darren Collison.

DC is scorching the net when it matters most. He’s hit 66.7% of all of his shots since the injury, and since the All-Star break, he’s been just as effective. He’s only shot once (he made it) in clutch situations, but the team is a +5 with him on the floor in the two clutch situations they had since the break. He’s been the guy the Pacers need at the end of games.

Bojan Bogdanovic is in charge on offense.

Bojan Bogdanovic is averaging 21 points on 15.7 shots per game since the All-Star break. If he was hitting his free throws like he normally does, he would be sniffing 50/40/90 in the trio of games.

But it isn’t just the scoring numbers, it’s the manner he is doing it. He’s handling the ball in the pick-and-roll. He’s getting isolation calls at the end of quarters. He is required to make reads now, and he’s doing a damn good job of it. Indiana needed someone to step up and score, and they have that guy at the moment. Hopefully, he can retain this play down the stretch run.

The schedule for the Pacers in March is their toughest month of the season. As the team navigates that stretch of play, two questions will be answered that I think will dictate their level of success in the final full month of the season.

How will the team play without Domantas Sabonis?

Domantas Sabonis recently suffered an ankle injury that will keep him sidelined for a handful of games. Thankfully, the schedule isn’t particularly challenging in the immediate future, but come mid-March, things start to ramp up. The team needs to win sans-Sabonis.

On the bright side – the Pacers won both of the two games Sabonis missed this season, and handily. Their total margin of victory was 42 points.

Kyle O’Quinn played well in those games in his place, averaging 14 and 9. But they were against the Nets and Magic. The upcoming opponents aren’t exactly a murderers row, but they will need O’Quinn to contribute in order to win games.

Can Tyreke Evans find some consistency?

I’m going to be asking this question until I die, aren’t I?

Tyreke had a good stretch right after Christmas for 10-15 games, but he has struggled in 2 out of 3 games since the All-Star break. He’s shot 35 percent from the field in that timeframe, and he has nearly as many turnovers as assists.

If he can recapture the stretch he had from Christmas until he injured his back in late January, that would be huge for Indiana. He posted 12.3 points per games and, more importantly, had shooting splits of 46.4/38.6/73.5. Those are great compared to how the rest of his season has been.

If he can close out the regular season with another month like that, the Pacers can hang with anybody.

I’m bad at making sweeping statements about just a handful of games, but hey, I want to talk about what Doug McDermott has done since the All-Star break. Here’s something I think…

Doug McDermott finds a niche for himself on this team in the final month.

McDermott is shooting 63.6 percent from deep in the 3 games since the break, posting about 9 points per game in the process.

He’s been effective yet disappointing so far as a Pacer. He just played his 56th game as a member of the Indiana Pacers, which is the 2nd most he has played with a team in a single season in his 5-year career. That’s pretty wild. The only season before this one with more games with one team was in 2015-16 with the Chicago Bulls, where he played 81 games. Incidentally, that was his most impactful offensive season by BPM.

Consistency could help Doug, and finding a rhythm on the second unit could really raise the level of play we see from the Pacers bench the rest of the way.

With 21 games to go, the Pacers are going to have to play damn near perfect to hold on to the 3-seed in the Eastern Conference. Keep an eye on all of these things throughout the 21 game stretch.