Through most of the second half last night, Jim O'Brien had Stephen Graham and Brandon Rush on the court at the same time. Normally Jarrett Jack would've played down the stretch, but I figured maybe JOB was giving Rush and Graham some pressure minutes since they were playing pretty well.
Not the case.
Mike Wells reports that Jack and T.J. Ford brought a little drama to the Pacers bench by getting into a heated argument which forced the two to be separated and Jack sent to the locker room to cool off. Jack was gone after the game but T.J. tried to keep a lid on the situation. This is from Mike's Pacers Insider post:
"I think it was the heat of the moment," Ford said. "At the end of the day you really don't want the fans to see that going on, especially during the game when you have kids. I want to apologize for my actions and what took place."
It's unknown why the two were arguing, but I was told this had been "brewing" for some time between them.
The argument came after Ford was the only player to take a shot on three straight possessions.
Honestly, this is great news. Regardless of where the truth lies and who said what the Pacers have needed something like this for a long time. A fed up, hold each other accountable, airing of grievances. A private airing would've been better but I would hope the team would go down swinging (although not at each other in a literal sense) so this is a natrual reaction with hope fading away and when this occurred the game was slipping away.
I can't imagine Jack letting this thing linger past last night so hopefully it will draw the team closer to keep grinding to the last game of the season.