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Pacers Seeking New Attitude on Road

Thaddeus Young's ferocious slam in the second quarter of the Pacers' 98-95 victory over New Orleans on Monday drew a foul from Terrence Jones and set up a three-point play, but it did more than that. It made a statement, and raised a question, too.

Before addressing the symbolism of it all, though, it deserves a pause for reflection and description. Young took a bounce pass from Monta Ellis in the lane, hesitated, and then heard Ellis shout "Roll!" He took one dribble to his left and rocked the rim with a vicious throw-down over Jones, the Pelicans' 6-foot-9 forward who had already blocked two shots in the quarter, drawing a foul and converting a three-point play.

Then the typically poised veteran screamed, as loud as he could, while his teammates stood and instinctively locked arms in a riotous celebration. It was still a topic of conversation in the locker room, too, punctuating the less-pleasant topics of conversation about the missed free throws late and the nearly-blown 16-point lead early in the second period.

"It was nasty," said Glenn Robinson III, who dresses next to Young. "He showed me a picture of it, actually. I said, 'You've got to get that made into a painting. A 10-foot painting.'"

"Oh, man, that was crazy," Jeff Teague said. "The whole bench erupted. He finally yelled. I've never seen Thad show any emotion. That was good."

"Yeah, man," Paul George added. "Thad is a sleeper. He surprises you and wows you with plays. He's got the nonchalant about him, but he can make big plays."

It's not as if Young had never dunked before. He's 6-foot-8 and he's in his 10th NBA season, for crying out loud. Search online and you can find a wide array of dunk videos. But he'll remember this one when he's old and gray and resting his sore knees.

"It was definitely one of my better ones," he said. "The good thing is, I wasn't the one getting dunked on."

As for his uncharacteristic reaction: "When you dunk on somebody, you've got to scream it down," he said. "That's a must."

This dunk stood out all the more because the Pacers have, to use George's term, some "nonchalant" about them, a characteristic that nearly cost them Monday's game. And that's the question they need to answer going forward. Can they take the energy and bravado Young showed in that singular moment on the road with them?

The Pacers have been two distinctly different teams this season. They are 16-5 at home and 5-14 on the road. Now that they're 21-19 one game shy of the midway point of the season, it's obvious they're going to have to find a way to win away from Bankers Life Fieldhouse if they're to move up in the congested Eastern Conference standings.

"It's quite surprising that it's so night and day," George said.

This week is as good a time as any to close the gap, with games at Sacramento on Wednesday, in Los Angeles against the Lakers on Friday, and Utah on Saturday. The Kings and Lakers are losing teams. Utah is not, but has a road game of its own in Dallas on Friday.

The opportunity is there. To take advantage of it, the Pacers will have to avoid many of the same issues that crept up against the Pelicans, who kept battling despite the loss of star forward Anthony Davis to a bruised tailbone in the third quarter after Myles Turner knocked him down on an attempted block of his dunk.

After outscoring New Orleans 32-18 in the first quarter and leading by as many as 16 points early in the second, the Pacers admittedly let up. Their defense softened, their offense slowed and their shooting suffered. They missed four of their final six free throws – two each from Robinson and Turner – and had three turnovers in the final 6 1/2 minutes.

Shortcomings that have been familiar in too many road games this season.

"We get on the road, we don't play as a team," George said. "We go off and do our own thing. That kind of puts us in a hole. You let a team get confident, especially at home, it's going to get away from us, and it always does."

"It's spirit," Turner added. "When we're at home the crowd's into it and everybody's hyped, but on the road everybody stays down. I don't know what the problem with that is. It's like we never find a lot of spark on the road."

Ball movement. Spark. Poise. Whatever it is, the Pacers need to find something to win enough road games to escape the morass of run-of-the-mill teams in the East. Maybe even a highlight-grade dunk now and then, just to have something to shout about.

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