The answers to the second question are pretty simple. The Pacers aren't the early-1990s Sonics, reinventing NBA defense. The Pacers are huge, they don't have any weak links among their heavy-minutes players, and they're smart.
Those first two factors — sheer size and the lack of a minus defender — are so basic and immune to strategy that they are easy to speed past in search of sexier answers. But they are the foundation of what's going on here. During a team meeting in training camp, Frank Vogel, Indy's recently extended head coach, called George Hill, Roy Hibbert, and Paul George to the front of the locker room and had them stand side by side, with their arms outstretched, according to Vogel and several players. The point was obvious: "I just wanted to illustrate to the guys what enormous length we have," Vogel says. George laughs when he recalls the scene: "I was like, 'What does coach have us doing up here in front of everybody?'"
Hibbert is the biggest, and Vogel decided early on that he preferred his center to hang back below the foul line on pick-and-rolls in the middle of the floor. David West is faster and more comfortable away from the rim; when opponents target West in the pick-and-roll, Vogel has him "blitz" out at opposing point guards, lunging at them out toward mid-court, hoping to cut them off, bump them, or make them pause before they can turn the corner.
