1.  Limit Turnovers 

This Pacers team does have a bad habit of making bad passes.  If they start tossing the ball around, the Heat will make the Pacers play in their game of transition.  That’s a key as well, stopping transition, but for this turnover battle, the Pacers have to make the smart passes, and get guys the ball in the best place for them to score.  Watch how they’re attacking the basket with the ball as Lebron James is an excellent defender, and can strip away at any time.  They have to just slow down the game, and get their passes around to each other in the right manner.

2.  Stop Transition

If they’re turning the ball over, the Heat will get out and run.  If you had Lebron James barreling down the court, why wouldn’t you run?  This is a team that does have some quickness on them, and guys who get to the basket, so the Pacers can’t afford to be letting the Heat run all up and down the court.  It’s a recipe for disaster, and the Pacers have that recipe when working that could beat the Heat.

3.  Killer Instinct

I think the Pacers have to go in very confident even if they’re not favored.  They can’t come in all lax, and wait for the game to come to them.  Lance Stephenson could be a HUGE x-factor as we’ll want to see how he performs after that break out game six performance against the New York Knicks.  Roy Hibbert is another guy to watch as he should be huge in the middle, and could get plenty of looks as the Heat don’t have the big men to contend with him.  That’s where the Pacers need to look early to get Hibbert going, and we’ll see that his confidence will be building.  This team can’t let the moment get to them, and come out TOO aggressive to make silly mistakes.  But play like they did in game one against the New York Knicks, where they looked like the better team.

These are just three small keys to victory. But they’re important factors in the game plan of the Pacers.  Seeing how this Pacers team handles this moment of playing in the Eastern Conference Finals is big.  We’ll have to see if they’re too aggressive, and make silly mistakes that get them down early.  Or if they can keep the game right at their pace, and keep it close to hopefully pull off the victory in game one.

Tomorrow, the two teams kick off another seven-game series, this time in the Eastern Conference finals. Some of the context is the same. The Heat, now defending champions, are favored again and possess the home-court advantage. The series boasts Lebron James, Dwayne Wade, and Eric Spoelstra versus Roy Hibbert, Paul George, and Frank Vogel. And like last year, the overblown “war of words” has begun.

But as we would expect, there are differences this time around, too. Here are a few of the main ones:

1. The Danny Granger injury. The Pacers have been so productive without him that’s it’s easy to forget that they’re playing without their best scorer from a year ago. Granger didn’t have a great series against the Heat last year, but he did take up a lot of attention from Lebron James and the Heat, attention that this year will probably go toward the Paul George.

It will be interesting to see what kind of role the Miami Heat’s Ray Allen plays in the NBA Eastern Conference finals against the Indiana Pacers.

2. The health of Chris Bosh. Last year, as you may recall, the Heat’s center and part of “the big three,” Chris Bosh missed most of the series with an injury. It definitely made things more interesting, but the Heat were able to get enough contributions from elsewhere to get the job done. Unless something changes, Bosh will be healthy this year. Against the Chicago Bulls, Bosh played a lot of minutes, scored in double digits in every game except one, and shot four for eight from three-point range. But that doesn’t mean he can guard Roy Hibbert. The two are very different kinds of players, and it should be interesting to watch.

3. The presence of Ray Allen. A year ago, Allen was preparing to take on the Heat as a member of the Boston Celtics. This time around, he plays for the Heat. Let’s be honest, Allen isn’t what he used to but he can still shoot the rock. He averages double figures in points on 40% shooting from 3-point land. Insert that kind of specialty into a lineup with the likes of James, Wade, and Bosh, and you’ve got all sorts of problems defensively.

4. No more Larry Bird. Last year, the Indiana legend and then-Pacers President of Basketball Operations made headlines by challenging the Pacers toughness late in the series against the Heat. He then departed from the organization after the season’s end. It remains to be seen whether the absence of pressure he created will be good or bad for the team.

5. Numbers-one-through-four on this list could suggest an advantage for the Heat, but the Pacers are better than they were a year ago. Their youth is further along in their development. They’ve showcased that fact at times during the playoffs, especially in dismantling the higher-seeded New York Knicks in six games. George and Lance Stephenson, among others, are much improved. During the regular season, the Pacers beat the Heat two out of three times, largely by dominating in the paint. But obviously these games mean more. Are the Pacers ready for the big-time? We will see soon enough.