Author: Mark Montieth / Source: Indiana Pacers
It was just a breakaway dunk, something you see in every NBA game. Every high school game, for that matter. Darren Collison, though, is just 6-foot tall. And he’s 31 years old. And he’s playing in his 10th NBA season. And he’s had his share of knee injuries, like any other NBA veteran.
So, that breakaway dunk early in the third quarter of the Pacers’ 37-point victory over Detroit Friday night wasn’t just another dunk. It was his first dunk of the season, and equaled the number of dunks he had all of last season.
Turns out there’s also a story behind it, one that reflects the camaraderie and spirit that is making the Pacers one of the NBA’s most intriguing teams.
Collison’s dunk, set up by Thaddeus Young’s hustling steal, set off a manic celebration on the Pacers’ bench. Teammates stood and screamed, jumped up and down, and ran in place to vent their joy.
Victor Oladipo, with help from Young, then picked off another steal that led to Collison hitting a step-back 3-pointer, which increased the Pacers’ lead to 18 points and forced a Pistons timeout.
With Bankers Life Fieldhouse going bonkers, Myles Turner ran up to Collison, crouched, and pretended to take pictures of him, paparazzi-style. Collison, meanwhile, was laughing and pointing toward the bench at someone, then waved his hand from side to side.
He likely was addressing Tyreke Evans. The two have had a running commentary the past few weeks on who was going to execute the most dunks this season. Evans has just one, which came early in the blowout victory at Utah on Nov. 26 when the Pacers were beginning a four-game road trip. But that was one more than Collison, and Evans had been declaring Collison wasn’t going to get any.
“They’ve been talking stuff for a couple of weeks about this dunk,” Young said. “We all went crazy because we didn’t think he was going to do it.”
Teammates were still talking about it when the media was let into the locker room. TJ Leaf, who dresses two locker stalls to the right of Collison, came back from his shower, looked at Collison with a wide smile and said, “Staring at the rim, bro!” Turner, meanwhile, was watching a replay of it on his phone.
So, anyway, Collison has tied Evans in the dunk category.
“It’s one-to-one now,” Young declared as Evans headed out of the locker room.
“I’m about to get three, watch,” Evans said, smiling.
“D.C. jumped a little higher than Tyreke did, so it’s looking like D.C. might get more,” Young said loudly.
“My knee was messed up, man,” Evans said.
Evans’ knee is better now, and the Pacers are better than they’ve been all season. Better than at any time last season, too, and for that matter anytime since early in the 2013-14 season. The margin of their 125-88 victory has to be taken with an asterisk, because the Pistons turned in a performance so blatantly poor that they conducted a team meeting afterward in the locker room and coach Dwane Casey apologized to the Pistons’ fans….
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