One key to the Wizards moving on without Gilbert Arenas is finding another few key players, whether on the current roster or not, to step up. Tonight, that guy was Nick Young. Can he be that guy every night? We'll have to wait and see.
Young came through with 25 points and nine rebounds tonight from his shooting guard position for the Wizards.
Andray Blatche also turned in an excellent statistical game, achieving 22 points and 11 rebounds. Blatche was only, er, nine steals away from a triple-double as the Wizards improved to 1-0 without head coach Flip Saunders on the bench. Washington shot over 42% from three-point land, and won the overall rebound game 54-47.
John Wall, coming off the bench once again tonight as he continues to recover from a knee injury, contributed ten points, and one highlight worthy alley-oop assist to Blatche in the closing minutes as the game got away from the Pacers late.
The Wizards outscored the Pacers by 14 points in the second half for the rare complete victory. Now if they could only just do it on the road...