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The Pacers and Knicks are the only two teams left standing in the Eastern Conference, as each team seeks to seal a ticket to Oklahoma City to face a rested and waiting Thunder team.

Indiana jumped out to a commanding 3-1 lead in the Eastern Conference Finals, aided, in part, by a massive comeback in what has become a pivotal Game 1 in New York that saw the Knicks melt down in the fourth quarter. On the brink of elimination, the Knicks won a wire-to-wire victory against the Pacers on Thursday night to extend the series to at least six games.

Now, the two teams will head back to Indiana as the Knicks seek to continue their road dominance and push the series to a Game 7 back in Madison Square Garden. New York is 6-2 on the road during the playoffs, while the Pacers have only lost four games all postseason, two being to the Knicks.

The Knicks, as a franchise, are 0-15 in series in which they’ve faced a 3-1 deficit, and the last instance of an Eastern Conference Finals team surrendering a 3-1 lead was in 1981, when the Celtics came back to beat the 76ers.

Both the Knicks and Pacers have engineered their fair share of miracle comebacks this playoffs, with the Knicks overcoming 20-point deficits twice against the Celtics and once against the Pacers, while Indiana has had at least one massive comeback in each series so far, against the Bucks, Cavaliers, and Knicks.

In Game 5, the Knicks were able to tap into a defensive gear they had struggled to maintain throughout the playoffs, limiting stars Tyrese Haliburton and Pascal Siakam to a combined 23 points on 20 shots, while Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns took turns dominating offensively. The Knicks also seemed to find success with bench units that coach Tom Thibodeau had been reluctant to turn to before this series, with Landry Shamet, Delon Wright, and Precious Achiuwa all finding success in limited minutes.

The Pacers have yet to lose two games in a row in the playoffs, and have won games following a loss by an average of 18.3 points. They are also hoping to be bolstered by Aaron Nesmith returning to form after he played just 16 minutes in Game 5 while struggling through an ankle injury. He is no longer listed on the injury report. Haliburton has vowed to be more aggressive getting downhill in Game 6, after the Knicks’ increased defensive intensity seemed to take him out of his game and limited him to just seven shot attempts.

The Knicks will be looking to their wings to knock down open shots. While OG Anunoby and Mikal Bridges are each averaging 16 points per game, they’re shooting 29% and 33% from three, respectively, and have been unable to take advantage of the open looks created by the attention Brunson and Towns command. On the other side of the coin, Pacers shooting guard Andrew Nembhard has been uncharacteristically quiet, averaging just 9.0 points and 2.6 assists per game for the series after averaging 14.6 PPG and 6 APG in the first two rounds.

Brunson and Haliburton have proven themselves to be two of the most clutch performers in the sport, which will make any contest that’s tight going into the final five minutes that much more exciting.

While it can be expected that the star tandems of Brunson and Towns and Haliburton and Siakam will show up in such a high-pressure game, whether or not this series gets extended to seven games will likely come down to which team’s ancillary players are able to make the other team pay for allowing them room to find their offense.

We want to hear from you. Will the Pacers close out the series and advance to their first NBA Finals since 2000, or will the Knicks be able to extend the series to a winner-takes-all Game 7?

A year after falling to Indiana in the 2024 Eastern Conference Semifinals, the Knicks will get another shot at them in the 2025 Eastern Conference Finals. Star guard Jalen Brunson is looking forward to the opportunity to take advantage of the second chance.

“I mean, it still kind of bothers me,” Brunson said on Monday, referring to last year’s series, per Zach Braziller of The New York Post. “Obviously it was a missed opportunity last year playing them at home in Game 7, regardless of who we had out there.”

The version of the Knicks that finished last season looked far different from the group that will take the court on Wednesday in Game 1 of the Eastern Finals. The 2023/24 roster didn’t feature Karl-Anthony Towns or Mikal Bridges, the club’s two major 2024 offseason additions. Plus, as Brunson alludes to, last year’s team was incredibly banged up, with key players like Julius Randle and Mitchell Robinson unavailable for that do-or-die Game 7 and OG Anunoby unable to play more than five minutes.

This time around, the Knicks are fully healthy and are riding high after a strong first-round showing against the upstart Pistons and an unlikely second-round upset of the defending champion Celtics.

Just about everyone had penciled in an Eastern Finals showdown between the 64-win Cavaliers and 61-win Celtics, but New York and Indiana played spoiler and now the Knicks will enter their third-round series holding home court advantage and as betting favorites. BetOnline.ag lists New York as a -160 favorite to advance to the NBA Finals.

Knicks fans have plenty of reasons for optimism. After all, last year’s battle between these two teams nearly went their way even without Randle’s scoring, without Robinson’s elite rebounding, and without Towns and Bridges, who have been two of New York’s most valuable contributors in this postseason. The front office’s vision – Brunson and Towns serving as offensive engines while Bridges, Anunoby, and Josh Hart terrorize opponents on defense – has come together perfectly in recent weeks.

These Pacers, conversely, look pretty similar to last year’s team. In fact, with the exception of Bennedict Mathurin (injured for the 2024 playoffs) replacing Isaiah Jackson (injured for the 2025 playoffs), the Pacers have the exact same top nine players in minutes played that they did last postseason.

Skeptics would also point out that Indiana has benefited in a major way from injury luck over the past two springs. Bucks point guard Damian Lillard went down with an Achilles tear in the first round of this year’s postseason, while several Cavaliers – including Darius Garland, Evan Mobley, and De’Andre Hunter – were battling health problems in the second round.

But underestimating this Pacers team would be a mistake. Indiana was doing just fine against healthy versions of Milwaukee and Cleveland before those injuries occurred and has a better overall net rating (+5.5) during these playoffs than that of the Knicks (+0.1). The Pacers are especially dangerous when they’re dictating the speed of the game, which they’ll be looking to do against a Knicks squad that ranked 26th in the NBA in pace during the regular season (Indiana was seventh).

The Pacers have also been getting a balanced offensive attack from their starting lineup and bench this spring. All five starters are averaging at least 14.6 points per game, led by Pascal Siakam (18.8 PPG) and Tyrese Haliburton (17.5 PPG and a playoff-leading 9.3 APG), with Mathurin, T.J. McConnell, and Obi Toppin combining for 28 points per contest off the bench. Indiana’s 117.3 playoff offensive rating is easily the best mark of any of the four remaining teams.

The last time the Knicks appeared in the NBA Finals in 1999, they defeated the Pacers in the Eastern Finals to get there. The Pacers returned the favor a year later, beating the Knicks in the Eastern Finals to represent the conference in the NBA Finals. They haven’t gotten back since. Whichever team wins this series and makes their first Finals appearance in a quarter-century will have to get past an old rival to do it.

We want to know what you think. Which team will win the 2025 Eastern Conference Finals?

Vote in our poll, then head to the comment section below to weigh in with your thoughts and predictions!