NBA - Main

More possessions, more points. More points, more wins

The earlier in a possession you start your play the more points it will get you on average.

Playing against a set halfcourt defense is harder than playing in transition

Playing at a slow pace will generally hurt the offense, but it will often come down to how the offense is played slowly. If a team waits until 12 seconds on the shot clock before starting anything then they're pushed into taking more bad shots because they don't get the time to look for better shots off of actions.

Basically the challenge for the defense is to defend for 24 seconds. If you don't do anything for 10 of those, then the challenge for the defense is to defend for 14 seconds. The latter is a lot easier than the former.

fear of judgement from the crowd

On top of everything else here, NBA players are supposed to take the first good shot available, not spend the whole shot clock looking for the best possible shot. Couple reasons: the quicker your trigger, the more the defense has to bite on pump fakes/close out hard. As soon as your opponent thinks you might hesitate on an open shot, they can help a lot more on defense and also start baiting you into bad shots by waiting for your hesitation and then closing out. Also more passes/actions = more opportunities for turnovers.

Watch the Pacers and you'll understand it more clearly

A 24 second shot clock doesn’t really allow for much of a slow pace and that’s just how the league likes it.

a slower game takes away the one reason why most all stars are all stars - athleticism.

The Knicks are not really a fast paced team. They replace those fast possesions with offensive rebounds, in which Mitchell Robinson is elite.

We do sometimes score in transition though.

Transition is statistically more efficient than half court offense

It’s more fun