Midway through the third quarter of January 10th's nationally televised handcuffing of the New York Knicks, Indiana Pacers forward Paul George jumped a passing lane near the top of the key, intercepted a pass, and with an effortless indifference, slammed the basketball through the rim. 

Knicks head coach Mike Woodson responded with a quick time-out and shake of his head. Moments before TNT went to a commercial break, color commentator (and the greatest Pacer in franchise history) Reggie Miller declared George as the new face of Indiana’s franchise.

As there are only 30 teams and only one face can be “the face” at a given time, passing-of-the-torch declarations like Miller’s are special. The Indiana Pacers have unofficially been Danny Granger’s team since 2008, when he first led them in scoring and seemed to be the type of player that could help change the franchise’s cracked image.

Now, six years later, at an age that was supposed to be his prime (29 years old) Granger’s spot as the franchise’s best/most important player has been usurped by George.

George is their leading scorer, shot-taker, three-point shooter, and a top-two defender. He’s second on the team in assists, third in rebounds, and first in steals, filling in for Granger at the small forward position while he recovers from knee surgery.

When Granger returns, the Pacers—the NBA’s best defensive team and a possible championship contender—have two options regarding how they can deal with him: 1) Gradually work to insert him back in the starting lineup as the team’s small forward, shifting George down to the backcourt and pushing Lance Stephenson (one of the league’s most pleasant surprises) to the bench, or 2) Have Granger embrace a new role by coming off the bench and embodying the burst of offensive energy Indiana desperately needs.

George is playing like an All-Star, and All-Stars shouldn’t have their position or role changed in the middle of a season. In the 14 games where his usage percentage has been at least 25.8%, the Pacers are 11-3..

Only three 22 year olds in NBA history grabbed at least 7.6 rebounds per game while scoring at least 16.9 points per game while shooting over 37.3% from behind the three-point line: Dirk Nowitzki, Kevin Love, and Chris Webber. Paul George would be the fourth if he can keep his numbers where they are.

When you throw 1.7 steals per game into the mix, out of every player in league history, only five have hit all those averages for a complete season (Larry Bird four times, Shawn Marion twice, Greg Ballard, Fat Lever, and Webber). Not bad company for George to join if he’s capable of maintaining his numbers.

It’s a situation incredibly similar to what went on in New York with Amar’e Stoudemire. While he was hurt, the Knicks thrived by shifting Carmelo Anthony (the face of their franchise) to power forward and surrounding him with shooters. Since returning, Stoudemire has come off the bench in all seven games he’s played, and there’s no reason to believe this isn’t a permanent transition.

Why is bringing Granger off the bench a good idea? Well, offensively the Pacers die just about every time their reserves enter the game. The likes of Gerald Green, Tyler Hansbrough, D.J. Augustin, and Ian Mahinmi haven’t played well this year, and none are anywhere near talented enough to carry a team’s scoring load for an extended period of time.

Stephenson and Green combine to average 48.7 minutes per game, which in an ideal world is too much. Having Granger come in off the bench to bite a chunk off both their playing time would be a perfect solution. And having him out there for the 12 minutes George is on the bench should severely limit the team’s overall offensive woes.

The Pacers badly need help on offense. And how they use Granger upon his arrival could be the difference between another second round exit and a serious shot at the NBA championship.

Michael Pina is a writer for ESPN’s TrueHoop Network and ScoreBig.com. Follow him on Twitter: @MichaelVPina

THIS is the kind of win the Pacers have been looking forward to against the Bobcats. After a heartbreaking 1-point loss in the second game of the season and a tough-fought home win a few nights ago (that required a David West triple-double), the Pacers finally got their act together to overpower the Bobcats in an impressive 103-76 thumping.

Apart from a brief stretch from the end of the first quarter to the first few minutes of the second, the Pacers dominated their opponents at both ends of the floor. They almost doubled the Bobcat's rebound total (60-31), blocked 9 shots, and assisted on 25 of their 36 field goals.

Roy Hibbert had 18 points, hitting all 8 of his free throw attempts, while Paul George had 16 and 10, George Hill had 16 , and David West had 15. It was a solid win against a bad team, and the road will unfortunately get much tougher from here on.

The Central leading, 25-14 Pacers play the Magic in Orlando tomorrow night. It will be a good time to stock up on wins too, because they will next face the Rockets (who are slumping but lethal because of Harden) at home before embarking on a nasty four-game road trip out West.

It's a real shame the Pacers couldn't have held on in this one against the Brooklyn Nets. After exploiting the Nets defense for the majority of the night, the Pacers stopped executing in the 4th and fell from an 8 point lead to lose 97-86, snapping their season-high 4-game winning streak.

David West backed up his first career triple-double with 27 points on 11-19 shooting, which is great to see considering he had been in a slump before the last two games. Paul George returned from illness but still didn't look 100%. He had 15 points, 12 rebounds and 6 steals but shot only 6-18 and didn't seem to really have his legs under him. George Hill is also still recovering from bronchitis and had 13 points.

The Pacers really could have used Lance Stephenson tonight, but he left the game for good just 6 minutes in after injuring his right foot. The Pacers also could have used Roy Hibbert's offense, if he is capable of ever finding it again. The big fella was again a non-factor on the offensive end, scoring only 6 points, though he did have 7 rebounds and 6 blocks to go with 5 fouls.

It's pretty clear the Pacers need Hibbert to at least have some impact on the offensive end if they would like to challenge the likes to Miami, New York and yes, Brooklyn, in the Eastern Conference. Right now it's no longer a matter of "will Hibbert snap out of his slump?" Slumps don't last this long. I'm afraid this is it. This might be as good as the Pacers' max contract player will ever get.

Watching the Pacers play, it's also obvious that they really need Danny Granger's offense. Right now they've got David West and Paul George as the main on-two punch, with George Hill capable of occasionally stepping up to produce points and big shots. But with Hibbert being practically useless offensively, they could really use Granger's shooting and all-round scoring ability to take some of the pressure off the rest of the team, which continues to be the second worst in the league in terms of putting points on the board.

The bench is still a mess, but Ian Mahinmi and DJ Augustin are showing signs of turning things around, and if Granger's return can shift Lance Stephenson to the second unit, that might help transform them into something decent enough to challenge other teams' second units. A second unit of Augustin, Stephenson, Green, Hansbrough and Mahinmi is not great, but it certainly looks a lot less awful than it does now.

David West said after the game last night that Granger has been looking really good and should be rejoining the team during the next stretch of home games, which starts from Jan. 30 against Detroit and ends of Feb. 22, also against Detroit (with only a single road game against Philly on Feb. 6 in between). From the way he said things I am assuming that Granger is almost there and is currently working on his conditioning, which hopefully means a much shorter window for him to get back into the swing of things.

The key now is for the Pacers to hold the fort through this nightmarish road stretch until Granger gets back. The Pacers only get a day off before another back-to-back on the road against the Bobcats and the Magic. They then have one home game against the Rockets before a 4-game road trip out west against Memphis, Portland, Utah and Denver. If things get really bad, the Pacers could go something like 1-6 during this stretch, though I am more optimistic than that. I think a 3-4 record would be passable, and anything better is a bonus.

I could have sworn I wrote this one already but for some reason it disappeared.

I'm not going to rewrite the whole thing again.

David West returned to beast mode to post his first career triple-double with 14 points, 12 rebounds and 10 assists as the Pacers held off the Charlotte Bobcats 96-88 without Paul George, who sat out with an illness.

That's all there is to know.

I was worried about this game even though the Knicks were without their top scorer, Carmelo Anthony, who was serving a one-game suspension for trying to "talk" to Kevin Garnett after the Knicks lost to the Celtics. The Knicks still had JR Smith, and they still had Amare Stoudemire, Tyson Chandler, Jason Kidd and Steve Novak. On paper, it looked like bad matchups everywhere for Indiana.

But the Pacers buckled down once again and showed why they are currently the best defensive team in the league, holding the Knicks to a season low 76 points on 34.8% shooting, including 4-20 from three-point range (and two of those shots came in the final two minutes as the Knicks tried to make a comeback).

The Pacers only scored 81 points themselves, but they are the second lowest scoring team in the NBA (just ahead of the lowly Wizards), so it was nothing unusual. Paul George led the way (again) with 24 points and 11 rebounds, plus 5 assists and 6 HUGE steals. The unsung hero tonight was Ian Mahinmi, who finally started hitting some shots to finish with 13 points on 6-7 shooting to be the only other player in double digits for Indiana.

David West struggled again and is officially in a slump, but he battled hard and managed to not pick up a technical despite getting about a zillion bad calls against him. Roy Hibbert was in and out of the line up with back spasms, and George Hill played with bronchitis. When you also take into account the fact that the Pacers also didn't have their usual to scorer in Danny Granger, it's arguable that neither team really got a lucky break tonight with missing players.

The Pacers are now 22-14 and will be looking for their first four-game winning streak of the season when they take on the Bobcats in the final game of their four-game home stand. Remember, the Pacers have already lost against the Bobcats once, by a single point in the second game of the season. But that was when the Pacers were struggling and the Bobcats were playing relatively well. It will be interesting to see how much the Pacers have progressed and the Bobcats have regressed since then. If the Pacers are serious about challenging the Heat and the Knicks this season they have to put away the Bobcats in impressive fashion. A loss will represent a huge step back.