The NBA’s history is filled with stories of teams who followed up a crushing playoff loss with a league title the following season. The Bad Boy Pistons, Michael Jordan’s Bulls and more recently the Miami Heat followed this blue print, and the Indiana Pacers have all the ingredients to be the next team to follow this path to an NBA title. In the recent NBA playoffs, the Pacers brought the Heat to the brink of elimination, despite fact they played vast majority of the season without their second highest paid player, Danny Granger, and with a very young team and coach. The team’s front office, lead once again by president Larry Bird, has worked very well this off season to improve the team’s very weak bench and has now arguably the most complete roster in the league. Let’s look at all the factors why the Pacers will improve:

Paul George, Roy Hibbert, George Hill, Lance Stephenson and coach Vogel now have more playoff experience. This cannot be understated, nothing prepares you to play in key playoff games until you get to experience it for yourself. The Pacers had a tough series with their once arch rival NY Knicks and took the Heat to a game 7. Coach Vogel made some questionable decisions, but the playoff run should benefit him tremendously, he now should be considered with the NBA elite coaches. Paul George, who won the award for the NBA’s most improved player, is looking like a franchise player and he wants to resign with the Pacers. There are very few real centers left in NBA, the Pacers happen to have one of the best in Roy Hibbert signed through 2016.

Last season, Danny Granger only appeared in 5 games. In his career he has averaged 18 points and 5 rebounds, and before Paul George and Roy Hibbert’s explosion he was the franchise’s signature player. Granger is trying to come back from a serious knee injury, but the fact that he won’t be asked to carry the team should help. It’s also possible the Pacers could move him since he only has 1 year left on his deal. Worse case scenario the Pacers have a great asset to use on trade market.

The Pacers had arguably the weakest bench in the NBA playoffs- their options were DJ Augustin, Tyler Hansbrough, Sam Young, Gerald Green and Ian Mahimi. This summer the Pacers radically improved their second unit by bringing in PG CJ Watson who averaged 6.8 points and 2 assists while getting very few minutes as Deron Williams’ backup on Nets, Knicks sharp shooter Chris Copeland (shot 47% on 3 point shots in playoffs), and PF Luis Scola from the Suns. Scola was a tremendous acquisition as he will be a great compliment to David West (whom the Pacers resigned to one of the best contracts in NBA this summer for a player of his caliber). Scola is one of the best low post offensive players in NBA (he is a career 50.4% shooter), and while he is a serious defensive liability he will play alongside Hibbert and Mahimi who are excellent at protecting the rim.

You can't teach size, Pacers are stacked with players of above average height at their respective positions. They will continue to dominate on the boards and could be the best defensive team in NBA. The other teams in East will have a hard time matching up against the Pacers. On top of being tall, the Pacers key players are still in their primes and, now that they have a strong bench, they will have fresher leagues in the later stages of playoffs.

Compared to all the other elite team in the East the Pacers do not have many question marks. Will Wade be healthy enough to be a strong compliment to Lebron and will the Heat suffer from lack of hunger? How will Derrick Rose play after such a long layoff due to a knee injury? Do Pierce and Garnett have enough left to improve the Nets? Will the Knicks super expensive front line ever work well together? The Pacers added some perfect complimentary pieces to a strong core who should be vastly improved after last season’s playoff run. Look for Larry Bird’s Pacers to battle his old nemesis Pat Riley’s Heat (who coached the Lakers when Bird was on Celtics) in the Eastern Conference finals next season.

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About the author
David Amoyal
Grew up in Padova (Italy) and current resident of Boston (USA). Editor in chief and writer for Vavel USA. My writing idols are Bill Simmons, Jason Whitlock and Chuck Klosterman