Will Pacers’ forward Gerald Green carry his hot hand into the NBA Playoffs?

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Pacers’ Head Coach Frank Vogel chose to rest Roy Hibbert, Paul George, George Hill, and David West for what was the Pacers’ last regular-season game.

Gerald Green took advantage of the newfound limelight by scoring 34 points on ten of 14 shooting in a losing effort. The forward only averages seven points a game. “I just wanted to come into the game with the mindset of being aggressive,” Green said afterwards.

Tyler Hansborough added ten points and nine rebounds.

Pacers’ reserves tried valiantly to come back from an earlier 26-point deficit, but it was too late. According to the Pacers’ official website, it was the sixth straight game the Pacers had faced a deficit of larger than 20 points. They even got out-rebounded, which is unusual for the best rebounding team in the NBA.

While Vogel’s philosophy of resting players to get them ready for the playoffs is obviously not unusual in professional sports, the larger concern turns to momentum and sharpness in the playoffs. Will they be ready to play? They’ve lost five of their last six games with the only win come against a weak Cleveland Cavaliers’ team.

“I think this team has a great deal of potential to make some serious noise in the playoffs,” Vogel has said, but there will be no easy series for his team. If he’s concerned, he’s not showing it.

Last year’s team went into the playoffs losers of two of their last three, including a loss against the 76ers. That team went on to knock out the Orlando Magic in five games before losing to the eventual champions, the Miami Heat, in six games. Of course, that team also had the luxury of Danny Granger, who is still recovering from knee surgery.

This year’s Pacers begin their first-round, seven-game series against the Atlanta Hawks on Sunday at home, where they went 30-11 during the year.

You’ve had two excellent games.  Can you string together a few more of those, and finally come around to that potential that you’ve shown from time to time?  The two games of 15 and 20 points is nice.  But a consistent 10-15 points would be even nicer.  Making a good athletic play for a spectacular dunk is great.  It gets you the high light reels and some fame for that.  But those hustle plays and just making the right pass is an even better play.

I know there’s some potential with you as you averaged 12 points on the Nets last season.  That’s about where you should be with this time.  You’ll get the minutes if you can show the ability.  How about continuing to improve your field goal percentage as you’ve been right around 50% for the past two games?  7-13 from three point land is even better.  How can we bottle that up and make it available for you to use from now on?  The Pacers need you to come off the bench and be that scoring machine.  If you can get the rebounds even better. Your passing needs a touch up here and there.  And the defensive end can use work.

But if you can play as well as you’ve done for the next even three games, maybe that could lead to something in the right direction.  It’s one thing to have a bunch of athletic ability, it’s a whole other thing to put it all together. I will admit I’ve been very down on your play, but that was with good reason, the play wasn’t anything significant.  You lost some minutes to a rookie.  That ought to hit something in the brain.  Whatever was said before the Cleveland game, use that as continued motivation.  Whatever worked in the Orlando game, use that as motivation.  Whatever you can do to continue this sudden impact with the bench, the Pacers need it.  That bench has looked bad at times, and if you can give them something more, maybe everyone else will come around.  It’s going to take some great effort to keep up this great play, but you know what you are showing that you can do.