Shorthanded Pacers hold off Knicks in NBA Cup thriller

LOS ANGELES: The injury-hit Indiana Pacers held off the New York Knicks 106-104 on Friday, thwarting a Knicks comeback bid to leave New York's bid for an NBA Cup repeat in tatters.

The Knicks won the 2025-26 in-season tournament in what proved a curtain-raiser to their run to a first NBA championship since 1973.

But after coming up short in their bid to erase a 14-point third-quarter deficit, the Knicks fell to 0-2 in Cup play.

They are not mathematically eliminated, but in three prior editions of the Cup, no team with two group stage defeats has reached the knockout rounds.

With Tyrese Haliburton still sidelined with a hamstring strain, Pascal Siakam scored 19 points to lead a balanced Pacers attack. Aaron Nesmith scored 18 points, Kelly Oubre Jr. added 16 and Ivica Zubac and Andrew Nembhard chipped in 12 apiece.

Jalen Brunson scored 33 points and handed out 11 assists for the Knicks, who tied it at 87-87 early in the fourth quarter only for the Pacers to pull away again with a 15-2 scoring run.

The Knicks made one last push, cutting the deficit to two, but Karl-Anthony Towns – who scored 23 points and pulled down 15 rebounds – missed a potential game-tying basket with nine-tenths of a second remaining.

- 'Kept fighting' -

"Very proud of our team. We were pretty big underdogs coming into this game," said Pacers coach Rick Carlisle, whose team out-scored the Knicks 50-30 in the paint.

"Second half, it got difficult. New York is a championship team. They know how to make comebacks," Carlisle said. "Our guys stuck together and kept fighting together."

The Knicks are last in East Group B and will host the Cleveland Cavaliers and Miami Heat in their last two Cup group games.

In Miami, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Bam Adebayo scored 37 points each to lead the Heat to a 133-121 victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers.

After dropping the first four games of the season, the Heat are seeing what they'd hoped for when they brought in Antetokounmpo to team with Adebayo.

Adebayo added 14 rebounds, and Davion Mitchell chipped in 22 points and 17 assists to help the Heat improve to 2-0 in Cup play – top of the group – and 6-6 on the season.

Donovan Mitchell led Cleveland with 25 points and James Harden added 20 but the Cavs have dropped three of their last four games.

Franz Wagner continued his stellar play for Orlando, scoring 35 points with nine rebounds and 12 assists to lead the Magic to a 107-99 victory over the Milwaukee Bucks.

The Magic earned their first home win of the season. Just 5-7 overall they improved to 2-0 in Cup play. - AFP