INDIANAPOLIS — It didn’t take long for Pacers coach Rick Carlisle to notice something wasn’t right with Aaron Nesmith.
Barely three minutes into Thursday’s Game 5 loss to the Knicks, Nesmith — the hero of Indiana’s comeback victory in the opener of the Eastern Conference finals — was on the bench and replaced by Ben Sheppard.
Nesmith, who has been playing through a sprained right ankle since late in Game 3, missed seven of eight field-goal attempts in the game for a playoff-low three points while logging only 16 minutes in the Knicks’ 111-94 Game 5 victory.
“We were just looking for people to go in there and battle,” Carlisle said when asked about Nesmith after the game. “He got off to a bit of a slow start. I wasn’t sure if maybe he was slowed a little bit by the ankle.
“So I got Sheppard in there right away, and then [Bennedict] Mathurin got a game going, so that dug into Aaron’s minutes some. But everybody’s just gonna have to be ready for Game 6 [on Saturday].”
Mathurin scored a team-high 23 points in 25 minutes off the bench in his second straight 20-point performance following a slow start to the series with 11 combined points in the first three games.
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Nesmith had been labeled “a warrior” by teammates Pascal Siakam and Obi Toppin after remaining in the starting lineup and scoring 16 points in 32 minutes in Game 4, two days after suffering the ankle sprain that has had him listed as questionable on the injury report for each of the past two games.
“It’s stiff. It hurts, but it’s no excuse,” Nesmith said after Game 5, according to the Indianapolis Star. “Gotta be better. I was able to play Game 4. I could play today. There was no excuse. … I just need to play better.”
The 25-year-old Nesmith buried six 3-pointers and scored 20 points in the fourth quarter as the Pacers stormed back from a 14-point deficit with under three minutes to play before taking Game 1 in overtime.
He suffered the ankle injury in the third quarter of Game 3 before returning to the court in the fourth.
