Insider: Ivica Zubac's explosion evidence of Pacers' struggles against size

LOS ANGELES -- To Rick Carlisle, the narrative was simple. One of the Pacers opponents just had a hell of a game.

Ivica Zubac's performance on Sunday in the Los Angeles' Clippers' 114-103 win over the Pacers was something from a bygone era. The 7-foot, 240-pound Croatian did whatever he wanted and did it with out having to stray very far from the rim on either end.

With 31 points and 29 rebounds, Zubac became the first NBA player since Dwight Howard in 2018 to score at least 29 points and grab at least 29 rebounds. It was the third time it had been done in 40 years. He was 14 of 17 from the field and 3 of 3 from the line, and he blocked three shots. He helped Pacers center Myles Turner get into foul trouble with four fouls that held him to just over 20 minutes of action. He had 12 offensive rebounds, which was three more than the Pacers grabbed as a team.

"He had a great game," Carlisle said. "He had a great presence around the basket. We didn't do a good job on him. I don't know what else there is to say."

To an extent it really is that simple, and all the analysis to be done on Zubac's performance on Sunday is simply to marvel. He bullied everyone the Pacers tried to throw at him, whether it was Turner or forwards Jalen Smith and Isaiah Jackson or Goga Bitadze, who played 7:30 in relief. When the Pacers threw two bodies at him to try to box out, it didn't seem to matter. He pulled down rebounds from over top of them or simply ripped them away.

And when the Clippers fed him in the post, the Pacers simply had no answers for him. The game might have moved away from post-up isolation in the past 20 years, but it certainly worked for Zubac as he started possession after possession with his back to the basket and still got easy looks for hook shots in the lane and hit them over and over again.

"It was just his day," Jackson said. "It was one of those days where a lot of rebounds were just coming to him and his team knew that so they were just giving it to him, every time down the other end."

Zubac is averaging a modest 9.5 points per game this season, but he's also averaging 10.8 rebounds per game and he's had big scoring nights in the past. He scored 32 in a game last year against the Denver Nuggets, so it's not like the Pacers allowed something impossible to happen.

That being said, there were some signs on Sunday of a troubling trend that could present issues for the surprising Pacers going forward.

It's not impossible for the Pacers to outmuscle big teams. They just did it with two wins over an Orlando Magic squad that starts three players over 6-10 including 7-footers Mo Bamba and Bol Bol. The Pacers won the rebounding battle and outscored the Magic in the paint in both of those games. The Toronto Raptors had to go even bigger than usual against them with point guard Fred VanVleet out, but the Pacers won the rebounding battle in that game.

Still, the Pacers' strength comes from their speed and their skill. They play at the fifth fastest pace in the NBA and they take and make more 3-pointers than any team other than the Boston Celtics and Golden State Warriors, last year's NBA Finals teams. They can be outmuscled, and when their shots aren't falling and they can't run, they can be defeated and soundly so.

Going into last week, the Pacers were actually the best team in the NBA at making it hard for teams to score in the paint. No more. With big men Rudy Gobert and Karl Anthony Towns dominating in the lane, the Timberwolves scored 74 points in the paint in their 115-101 win over the Pacers on Wednesday. Those two combined for 44 points on 17 of 22 shooting and also grabbed 25 rebounds, helping the Timberwolves win 50-30 on the glass. The Denver Nuggets beat the Pacers in a tight one earlier this month because Nikola Jokic and Aaron Gordon gave them just a little more toughness inside. When the Bulls and Wizards beat the Pacers in October, they won overwhelmingly in the paint and on the glass.

One big problem the Pacers have is their size only goes so deep. The 6-11, 250-pound Myles Turner is one of the best shot-blockers in the NBA and he's having his best season as a professional on both ends, but when he's in foul trouble, as he was Sunday, they don't have a ton of options behind him for a true center. Daniel Theis was supposed to take that role when he was acquired from the Celtics along with Aaron Nesmith and others as part of the Malcolm Brogdon trade, but he hasn't played a game yet for Indiana and is out indefinitely after knee surgery.

Forwards Jalen Smith and Isaiah Jackson are both listed at 6-9 and with long arms and athleticism they can handle extended minutes at the 5. They probably both weigh more than the 215 and 205 pounds at which they're listed, but bulkier matchups like Zubac can cause them some problems. Reserve forwards Oshae Brissett and James Johnson can both play bigger than 6-7, but 7-footers aren't a good matchup for them. The 6-11 Bitadze is an option, but after playing double-figure minutes in each of the Pacers' first four games, he's only seen that much time twice since, including in the blowout loss to Minnesota.

So dealing with big men like Zubac ultimately requires the Pacers to use a lot of bodies.

"We've just got to do a better job of getting a body on guys like him and helping Myles," Carlisle said. "This is a situation where you've gotta have one, two, three guys helping out there. We didn't do it and he had a dominant game."

But even if they had, the Pacers would have had other problems. The Clippers were playing Sunday without stars Kawhi Leonard and Paul George as well as sharpshooter Luke Kennard, all out with injuries. As Carlisle noted, however, the remaining players take pride in still being able to win without Leonard and George and their greatest asset is their physicality. Five other players grabbed at least four rebounds and the Clippers scored 66 points in the paint, which meant Zubac wasn't the only one scoring there. The Clippers were just 6 of 32 from outside the arc but 36 of 62 (58.1%) inside of it.

The Pacers came up with the only answers they could when asked what it would take to fix the problem. Smith noted that they simply need to play tougher.

"I think it's just a hit-first mentality," Smith said. "I think we have to hit first. He just killed us on the boards because we didn't come into the game with that mentality. He killed us in there."

Jackson said the same.

"It's just playing physical," Jackson said. "Hit guys first, being the aggressor. Zubac was the aggressor today. He was hitting us first and getting rebounds. Once that happens, there's a trickle effect. A team picks up on that and it keeps going."

And point guard Tyrese Haliburton noted that players at his position need to be more involved in the work closer to the bucket.

"Our guards just have to do a better job of coming down and rebounding," Haliburton said. "Our bigs are doing all they can boxing out and things like that. Guys got to come down and help finish possessions. It kind of ebbs and flows when we're doing well and when we're not. But we just need more consistency."

There are times when the Pacers have simply shot themselves out of such trouble. They did that on Nov. 7 when they hit 22 3-pointers and got 37 points from Turner to defeat a massive New Orleans Pelicans squad that beat them 60-40 in the paint.

But Sunday was a reminder that it's not as easy to do that on the road. The Pacers were 9 of 42 from 3-point range and players other than Haliburton and Smith were 3 of 27. They play in Crypto.com Arena again Monday against the Lakers in the second game of their seventh-game road trip, but that means plenty of size and muscle if LeBron James and Anthony Davis are both available. And they'll see more size on the road with the Sacramento Kings on Wednesday, the Utah Jazz Friday and the Minnesota Timberwolves in Minneapolis on Dec. 7 along with more skilled squads in Portland on Dec. 4 and Golden State on Dec. 5.

At 11-8, the Pacers sit in fourth place in the Eastern Conference at the moment, but still being in that position or a similar one when they get back to Indiana could mean having to play better against teams that are bigger than them.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Pacers vs. Clippers: Zubac's explosion speaks to bigger issue for Pacers