Familiar Pacers open season looking for fresh start

A look at the Pacers roster for the team’s season opener in Charlotte, which they officially announced on Tuesday, reveals 15 players that are quite familiar to Pacers fans. Sure there are new faces, with rookies Chris Duarte and Isaiah Jackson and free agent rotation fillers, Torrey Craig and Brad Wanamaker among the 15, but the rest of the crew was around for last season which everyone wants to forget.

In order to move forward, the Pacers organization is seizing on a fresh start narrative, starting with a new and very competent coaching staff, headed by Rick Carlisle. There is also the reminder that last season was strange with so few fans, so the team tapped Jermaine O’Neal to narrate a…