Indiana Pacers start preseason with loss to Nets
October 11th, 2006
Al Harrington scored 28 points in his first game with Indiana Pacers after the 2 seasons
INDIANA PACERS 98 : 114 NEW JERSEY NETS
[ Pacers boxscore ][ Nets boxscore ]
At the first Pacers preseason game, they were defeated by New Jersey Nets. The game winner was quite obvious at the end of 3rd quarter, when Vince Carter began his show. Pacers couldn't do anything later and the scoreboard marked the first loss by Pacers at Conseco Fieldhouse Center.
Just before the game it was obvious that Stephen Jackson, Jeff Foster and Darrell Armstrong will be on inactive list and won't appear on the court. The Coach wanted to test young players more, fighting for the last spots on the roster, such as Rawle Marshall and Josh Powell. They were placed even on starting 5 along with Al Harrington, Jermaine O'Neal and Jamal Tinsley.
The start of the game was more succesful to Pacers, they managed to gain the 6 point lead at the end of the 1st quarter. But later, the game started to become equal, as Pacers offense began to struggle, Vince Carter and rookie Marcus Williams made a lot of great attacks. So only the 3 point lead by the Pacers after the halftime.
The 3rd quarter was decisive, when Vince Carter had 20 points in it. He was showing some highlight stuff, demostrating amazing dunks. Pacers defence couldn't do anything. Only Al Harrington of the Pacers was still fighting. He made some important layups and the lead by Nets was closed to 7 points, but at the very end of the quarter Jason Kidd ended some succesful attacks and complicated the events again.
Nets tried to end everything very soon and did it succesfully, the lead reached 19 points by them in middle of the last quarter and coach Rick Carlisle put all the leaders on the bench and let to play for young players. The game ended with 16 points victory by New Jersey Nets 114 : 98.
Vince Carter was awarded as the Player of the game scoring 39 points in this game. Jason Kidd and future successor Marcus williams helped him the best and had 19 and 16 points accordingly. Al Harrington worth to be mentioned the most of the Pacers. He had 28 points and 12 rebounds. Jermaine O'Neal added 19 points, scoring with excellent percentage. None of remaing players of the Pacers had points in double digits.
Coach Rick Carlisle after the game said, that he is happy with some player's performance, but some others need to work very hard. He didn't worry about the loss, it was just the first preseason game and some important players didn't play. He was very happy of 2 big men performance. Jermaine impressed me with the excellent shooting percent and Al showed some leader abilities. We hope we can show better basketball in the next game against Utah Jazz.
Special Vince Carter dunks gallery: [
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