I saw the Indiana Pacers this season, but it wasn't the team that's beating the Miami Heat

Adam Sandler, 50 Cent and I caught an Indiana Pacers game in Indianapolis on Feb. 4.

I don't know what those two, who were in Indianapolis for the Super Bowl the following day, thought about the Orlando Magic's 85-81 win over the Pacers in Bankers Life Fieldhouse. I thought it was borderline dreadful, and I'm not an NBA-hater.

Indiana was pushing a piano uphill all night in the game. It shot just 34.1 percent from the field, and was 4-of-22 from 3-point range. Orlando superstar center Dwight Howard easily got the best of the Pacers' big man, Roy Hibbert.

The Pacers dropped to a still-glossy 16-7 with the loss, but I figured the team was a house of cards. Today, that house of cards has a 2-1 lead on the Miami Heat in the NBA's Eastern Conference semifinals.

Indiana didn't play that game 3 1/2 months ago with guard George Hill, who was out with a chip fracture in an ankle. Seeing how Hill played Thursday night (20 points, 5 assists) in the Pacers' 94-75 pounding of the Heat in Indy, I guess I didn't see the complete Indiana team.

Hibbert likes playing against whoever or whatever it was Miami had in the middle Thursday more than he enjoys battling Howard, I'm guessing. Hibbert had 19 points and 18 points in Game 3.

I went to that game in February because it was the night before the Super Bowl, my pregame work was done, and I basically had nowhere else to go and nothing else to do. It was a chance to sit for two-and-a-half hours and vegetate. Little did I know I was watching an Indiana team that would be a serious threat to eliminate Miami from the playoffs.

I still think the Heat win the series and go on to win the East, but I'm pulling for the Pacers. Midwest, small-market, no-name team, all that good stuff that make network executives queasy.

The prospect of an Indiana-San Antonio or Indiana-Oklahoma City NBA Finals isn't what ABC/ESPN has in mind. But if that's how it shakes out, Miami and the Los Angeles Lakers simply need to buy better players.