The Pacers took advantage of playing on their home court and closed out the yappy Bucks on Thursday night. The Bucks, one of the classiest teams in the league, accepted the loss gracefully.

Just kidding. Patrick Beverly threw a ball at fans after they made a jab about the Bucks going to Cancun. He then bullied a reporter in the press pool leading him to be banned from appearing on ESPN going forward.

Beverly could learn a thing or two from a class act like TJ McConnell, who according to Doc Rivers, bought the entire Bucks coaching staff a bottle of wine.

But you know what, who cares about the Bucks? They're old news. The new news, according to Sinatra at least, is something to start spreading. The Pacers are headed to New York, New York to rekindle the rivalry with their old foes, the Knicks.

The rivalry is about as storied as they come for our franchise. From 8 points in 9 seconds, to the choke sign, to Roy Hibbert erasing Carmelo at the rim, whenever the Pacers and the Knicks face off something iconic seems to happen.

I find it a bit funny that when the teams last met in the playoffs the Knicks were the all gas, no brakes offense and the Pacers were the defensive stalwarts. This time the roles are reversed. Hopefully the results don't reverse as well.

One advantage that the Pacers have over seemingly every other team in the league is bench production. Even though the bench struggled at times during the Bucks series, they showed up in a major way last night.

The Knicks basically play their starters the entire game. It will be imperative that the Pacers push the pace to a point where the Knicks simply have to sub their top line or else risk exhaustion. Bench production is key to making that strategy effective.

We'll go more in depth on the matchup later, but for now revel in the fact that we won our first playoff series in 10 years and get ready for one of the highest trash-talk-to-basketball ratios in recent playoff series memory. How might you get ready for such a thing? I suggest starting with the article below (try reader view if you don't subscribe).

The stories behind Reggie Miller, the ‘skinny little twig’ who became one of the best trash-talkers ever
With the Pacers back in the playoffs, here are some of the greatest trash-talking moments of Reggie Miller’s Hall-of-Fame career.
The AthleticZak Keefer

Fever Season Starts Today

Well, the pre-season at least. We're truly spoiled for exciting basketball right now. You can catch the first glimpse of the new age Shaq and Kobe, aka Aliyah and Caitlin, on the WNBA app at 8:00 PM ET tonight.

See ya in the comments!

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