It should have been Tyrese Haliburton's night, but his dad sullied it taunting Giannis.
INDIANAPOLIS – “It was insanity,” Indiana Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said after it was over, after the madness that was the Pacers’ series-clinching, 119-118 overtime victory against the Milwaukee Bucks in Game 5, and I couldn’t tell you which part of the night he was referencing.
The start, when the Bucks scored the first 13 points and Carlisle was begging his players to “(bleeping) hit somebody”?
The end of regulation, when Tyrese Haliburton scored the Pacers’ final six points, including a dunk with 10 seconds left that forced overtime?
The first 4½ minutes of overtime, when Haliburton was missing six straight shots and Bucks guard Gary Trent Jr. was hitting four straight 3-pointers and the Pacers fans were leaving because the Bucks were pulling away?
The last 30 seconds of overtime, when Trent was committing the game’s final two turnovers and Haliburton was hitting its last two shots, including a layup against Giannis Antetokounmpo with one second left to win it?
Or what happened after all that? When Tyrese Haliburton’s father, John Haliburton, walked onto the court to taunt Antetokounmpo? And then when the postgame hug between Antetokounmpo and Pacers guard Bennedict Mathurin turned ugly, with Antotokoumpo advancing on Mathurin until teammates pulled him back?
Maybe Carlisle was talking about all of it.
Because it was insanity, Tuesday night at Gainbridge Fieldhouse, which folks around here will remember as one of the more remarkable victories in Pacers postseason history.
But which folks elsewhere will remember for what happened later.
John Haliburton confronts Giannis Antetokounmpo
Tyrese Haliburton didn’t know about what had happened — he didn’t know what his dad had done — until he got to the locker room. The story was exploding on social media, and isn’t it a shame that I’ve not yet described Haliburton’s game-winning play, or the play he made before that, or the three consecutive defensive plays he made in regulation that enabled the Pacers to force overtime?
We’ll talk about that soon, but first, here’s what everyone wanted to talk about with Haliburton afterward. Here’s what he said about his father’s postgame confrontation with Giannis:
“I had no idea it happened until I got to the back,” is how Haliburton began his remarks on the topic. “Me and my pops have talked about that, and I don’t agree with what transpired there from him. I think basketball is basketball, and let’s keep it on the court. We had a conversation, and I think he should just allow me to play basketball and stay over there. I’ll come to him to celebrate.
“I talked with him. I’ll talk with Giannis eventually about it. I don’t think my pops was in the right at all there. Unfortunate what happened there. This series was a lot of war of words, a lot of antics, a lot of stuff going back and forth. That’s part of the rivalry, what we’ve built here.
“It’s unfortunate what happened there. I don’t agree with what happened there. We’ll have a conversation. Everyone’s grown men. We’ll just go from there.”
From here the Pacers go to top-seeded Cleveland for the Eastern Conference semifinals, and that series could be brutal. The Cavaliers won 64 games this season, then swept the Miami Heat in the first round — winning the last two games by a combined 92 points. The Pacers won the season series 3-1 with Cleveland, but faced the bulk of the Cleveland roster just twice, splitting those games.
What happens in seven games? That story will unfold soon.
First, more about what unfolded Tuesday night.
Tyrese Haliburton deserved better from 'Pops'
The Bucks led 13-0 after four minutes, and built it to 20 points — 33-13 — in the first minute of the second quarter. The Pacers were doing weird things, like Myles Turner missing the rim from the left block, getting the rebound and then missing the rim from the right block. T.J. McConnell drove the lane, like he does, then missed everything on a layup. Bennedict Mathurin threw a pass to Turner, but Turner thought it was for the player behind so he let it go — and the player behind him was Trent, who took it 70 feet for a layup.
The crowd was booing at the end of the first quarter, and the Bucks had been on their best behavior. Pretty sure the crowd was booing the Pacers.
It was insanity, this game.
And afterward, Carlisle was making a peace offering to the Bucks. He normally sits down for his postgame news conference and opens it up immediately for questions, but after this game he had something to say.
“First of all,” Carlisle said by way of introduction, “there’s a lot to talk about — rivalry, and those kinds of things. From my perspective and our perspective, nothing but respect for the Bucks. What they threw at us to start the game and throughout the game was the thing champions do. We didn’t respond well early, but we stayed with it and we showed the kind of resilience we’ve shown all year.”
That was Carlisle making nice, because let’s be honest — between Haliburton’s dad and then Mathurin, this beautiful victory was sullied. Will people remember the way Turner and McConnell rebounded from their early struggles to combine for 39 points, or will people remember John Haliburton walking onto the court after the game, waving a towel bearing his son’s image in Giannis’ perplexed face? Will people remember Aaron Nesmith’s finest game in his finest season (19 points, 12 rebounds, three assists, no turnovers) … or will they remember a player on each team (Bucks guard Pat Connaughton and McConnell) trying to calm down Giannis after he could take no more postgame taunting?
This game — the 53 minutes of action until the final horn, not the nonsense that came afterward — deserved better. Tyrese Haliburton in particular deserved better. He was having a modest game until the fourth quarter, when he blocked Bobby Portis’ shot from behind and then ripped a steal from Giannis and then fought for a defensive rebound, all in the final 4½ minutes of regulation, all leading to baskets by the Pacers at the other end.
Haliburton’s heroics on the defensive end allowed the Pacers to get within 101-97 with 75 seconds left. After that, Haliburton’s offensive genius took over. He beat Trent for a scooping layup, then beat Giannis to the rim and was fouled, hitting both free throws, and then beat Trent to the rim for the overtime-forcing dunk.
Haliburton opened overtime with a 3-pointer, then missed six consecutive shots. The Bucks led 117-111 with 40 seconds left and career 86% foul shooter A.J. Green at the foul line. Fans were leaving Gainbridge Fieldhouse, and then Green hit the first free throw to make it 118-111. Now they’re pouring out. Green misses, and then clutch Andrew Nembhard buries a 3-pointer with 32 seconds left and steals a pass from Trent.
Haliburton beats Green to the rim for a bucket, converts the three-point play to draw the Pacers within 118-117 with 17 seconds left, and then Trent drops the ball out of bounds.
Now Haliburton is dancing with Giannis on the perimeter, stepping back for a 3-pointer — OH NO HE ISN’T — before exploding past Giannis to the rim for the game-winning layup.
Trent, once the hero, was now the goat — trading places in each role with Haliburton. This was the story, and it was something else. And then the game ended, and the story changed. Small outbursts of anger kept erupting all over the court, brushfires starting out of nowhere, as Giannis went from hugging T.J. McConnell to trying to attack Mathurin, and from hugging Nembhard to tracking down John Haliburton for one last burst of venom, going forehead-to-forehead with Tyrese Haliburton’s dad before finding Tyrese himself for a hug.
Afterward, Giannis was rightfully upset, even confused, by what had just happened.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Giannis said before unleashing a stream-of-consciousness on sportsmanship (“I believe in being humble in victory”) and family (“I try to keep my family away from the game)” and then getting to his initial interaction with Tyrese’s dad.
“At the moment I thought he was a fan, and then I realized it was Tyrese’s dad,” Giannis said. “I love Tyrese. He’s a great competitor. (But his father) coming on the floor and showing me his son’s towel and saying, ‘This is what we do, this is what we (bleeping) do, this is what the (bleep) we do’ — I feel that’s very, very disrespectful.”
Well, he’s right. The Bucks had been the bad guys all series, namely Bobby Portis, but with lots of nonsense from Kevin Porter Jr. and even some bizarre behavior from Dame Lillard, but on this night the Pacers won the game, won the series, but lost a chunk of themselves because of a guy who doesn’t even play for them. But his son does, and his son is the face of the franchise, and it was his son’s face that John Haliburton was waving at Giannis Antetokounmpo after Tyrese had just scored the game-winner on him.
It looks bad. The noise nationally will get ugly. The Cleveland series can’t start soon enough.
Find IndyStar columnist Gregg Doyel on Threads, or on BlueSky and Twitter at @GreggDoyelStar, or at www.facebook.com/greggdoyelstar. Subscribe to the free weekly Doyel on Demand newsletter.