Pacers eliminate Knicks and will play in NBA Finals against Oklahoma City

Led by Pascal Siakam's 31 points, the Indiana Pacers defeated the New York Knicks 125-108 on Saturday and advanced to their first NBA Finals in a quarter-century.

Indiana, which finished the Eastern Conference finals against the Knicks 4-2 on aggregate, will now compete with the favored Oklahoma City Thunder for the first ring in its history.

Until now, the Pacers had only reached the Finals in the 1999-2000 season, when they lost to the Lakers of Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant.

Indiana has earned this second chance in a dream playoffs, to which it arrived as the fourth seed in the East.

Leading the final push was Cameroon's Pascal Siakam, already a 2019 NBA title winner with the Toronto Raptors. 

The power forward was the top scorer of the night with 31 points and was chosen as the Most Valuable Player (MVP) of the East final.

Indiana's other star, point guard Tyrese Haliburton, also shined with 21 points and 13 assists.

The Knicks had forced Game 6 with Thursday's win in New York and had hopes of extending the series to a seventh and final game in front of their home crowd at Madison Square Garden.

But the Pacers, with the encouragement of their 18,000 fans at Gainbridge Fieldhouse, made no further concessions and ended a tie that rekindled a rivalry between the two franchises that dates back to the 1990s. 

The Pacers had already been New York's executioners in their previous appearance in the East finals, also in 2000.

This Saturday the Knicks were weighed down by their outside shooting woes, with a 9-32 record on three-pointers (28.1%), and the physical problems of Karl-Anthony Towns.

The Dominican-American center finished with 22 points and 14 rebounds, and point guard Jalen Brunson had 19 points. 

After eliminating the top seed in the East, the Cleveland Cavaliers, the Pacers will now have to pull off the biggest upset of the playoffs to beat Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the great dominator of this season.