The Denver Nuggets, following their coach’s advice to start behaving and playing like champions, and the Indiana Pacers ensured that their semifinal series wouldn’t see any clean sweeps.
The Pacers won two consecutive games at home against the New York Knicks, evening their Eastern Conference series at 2-2, with Game 5 scheduled at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday night.
“We simply did what was expected of us,” said Tyrese Haliburton after the Pacers convincingly defeated the Knicks 121-89 on Sunday. “When you’re playing at home, you’ve got to defend your turf, and that’s exactly what we did.”
Meanwhile, the Nuggets haven’t had the same success in their series against the Minnesota Timberwolves.
After losing twice on their home court, the Nuggets were motivated by critics who doubted them and took aim at Nikola Jokic following his third MVP award.
In response, they defeated the Timberwolves twice in Minneapolis, bringing the series to a tie as they head into Game 5 at Ball Arena on Tuesday night.
“We came here with the goal of winning two games, and we achieved that. Now we’ve regained home-court advantage,” said Nuggets coach Michael Malone after Denver’s 115-107 victory on Sunday night. “We need to defend our home court and not allow them to win a third game at Ball Arena. That’s a message to our fans: come out and make our arena an intimidating place.”
