How Celtics’ ‘Firepower’ Challenged Pacers With Dominant Runs

BOSTON — The Celtics trailed by two points coming out of the first quarter of Game 2 against the Indiana Pacers.

That didn’t last for long when the Celtics flew out of the gates by scoring the first 17 points of the quarter as part of 20-0 run in their Game 2 victory, their first in such a setting this postseason.

The Celtics have always had arguably the league’s most-talented team from start to finish. The Pacers felt that was on full display at TD Garden on Thursday night.

“They played better for more stretches than we did,” Pacers forward Pascal Siakam said. “They had a lot of big runs. We were getting very close, just not quite there. Our energy wasn’t what it was supposed to be. They had more rebounds and everything. They just played better than us. We gotta look ourselves in the mirror and move on.”

To get specific, Indiana watched the Celtics set the tone in two key areas: spacing and athleticism.

“They have a lot of firepower,” Indiana guard T.J. McConnell said. “We just have to combat those runs and I thought we made runs of our own tonight.”

“These guys spread you out a little differently than New York does,” Rick Carlisle said. “They have great athletes. They beat us to some balls. We gotta flip that on Saturday night.”

Boston took a commanding 2-0 lead and shifts the series to Indiana with hopes of clinching an NBA Finals appearance in short order.