The big what-if

 Seven minutes.

Seven minutes in Oklahoma City last night, and Tyrese Haliburton already had nine points. He was already 3-for-4 from Threeville. He had Game 7 Legend on speed dial, because already you could look 41 minutes into the future and see him doing something wondrous again, a last-second parabola splashing home to give the Indiana Pacers an NBA championship and touch off an almighty clamor in heaven from Roger Brown and Mel Daniels and George McGinnis and all the other OG Pacers champs.

Seven minutes.

Which was all Tyrese Haliburton got to play last night.

Because down there in the court, out by the 3-point arc, Haliburton jab-stepped in, stepped back and then drove hard for the tin. And went down almost immediately, screaming in pain, his right Achilles in shreds and his Game 7, his playoffs, his season over.

And for all practical purposes, so was his team's.

Oh, they didn't go away, these Pacers, because going away is not in their DNA. TJ McConnell stepped into the Haliburton void and did what he could, going for 16 points, six rebounds and three assists in 28 minutes. Bennedict Mathurin stepped up, too, with a 24-13 double-double in 33 minutes off the bench. Pascal Siakam added 16 and Andrew Nembhard 15.

And Indiana led at halftime, 48-47.

But without Haliburton, they couldn't sustain it. Oklahoma City -- the best team in the NBA this season, winners of 68 games -- had league MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren, and they rolled over the Pacers like a tidal wave.

SGA finished with 29 points, five rebounds, 12 assists, two blocked shots and a steal. Williams scored 20 with four boards, four dimes and two steals. Holmgren went for 18 points, eight boards and five blocks. They scored 67 of the Thunder's 103 points in the 103-91 win, as the Thunder took command by outscoring the Pacers 34-20 in the third quarter.

So first NBA title for the franchise in Oke City, and playoff MVP hardware for SGA, and validation for the notion that good people playing beautiful basketball remains a formula for success in the NBA.

And the Pacers?

They won 18 fewer games than the Thunder, and still took the Finals to seven games for the first time in nine years. Erased the team with the league's second-best record (Cleveland) in five games. Erased the New York Knicks in six. Won with miraculous last-second shots ...and with full-throttle flurries that left opponents' tongues painting the floor ... and with epic comebacks no team without their plus-size portion of grit could possibly have achieved.

What they did, in the end, was put together the greatest playoff run in the franchise's NBA history. What they did was take Indiana, the Basketball State, on a ride it will not soon forget.

No, they couldn't bring home the title, not without Haliburton, not without the injury that will forever be the big what-if in all of this. But they left with the Thunder's skin under the fingernails clawing for it.

Because that, to paraphrase Sean Connery in "The Untouchables," is the Indiana way. Damn right it is.