‘Overrated’ rang out inside the Cleveland Cavaliers’ arena.
The most underrated player in the NBA did what Olympic gold medal winners and All-Stars do.
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Tyrese Haliburton won another battle, grabbed his own missed shot, and drilled the biggest basket of the playoffs — on the way to a stunning appearance in the Eastern Conference finals.
“First of all, Tyrese Haliburton is not an overrated player,” Shaquille O’Neal said on Inside the NBA.
“He’s a great player. He plays the right way.”
Then one of the greatest big men in league history gave the biggest name on the small-market Indiana Pacers huge props.
“All the kids out there – the ones that can’t jump high and don’t have the Steph Curry form – watch him (Haliburton) and steal all that he does.”
Haliburton professionally silenced Cleveland fans and Donovan Mitchell, handing Indiana a 4-1 triumph in the conference semifinals.
Haliburton also made NBA Twitter look like a bunch of idiots.
Days after Chelsea’s Cole Palmer reminded Premier League ‘trolls’ that it’s much easier to tweet dumb things on social media than score a brilliant penalty kick to cap off a 3-1 win, Haliburton drained a 24-foot, step-back 3-pointer with 1 second left in Game 2.
It was Pacers 120, Cavs 119 inside Cleveland’s silent arena.
It was another powerful reminder that the 25-year-old Haliburton is much more than just another name in an absurd anonymous poll that didn’t have the guts to put real names to paper.
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“Overrate THAT,” Haliburton tweeted last week, while Indiana bullied Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Milwaukee Bucks with a 4-1 first-round series knockout.
This week, Haliburton sank another game-winner and turned the Pacers into the hottest team left in the bracket.
“I didn’t know we had beef,” said Haliburton, referring to all the Cavs fans chanting ‘overrated’ at him.
“Good for them. That came out of nowhere. … Now that that label’s there, it’s going to be every time (I) play them.”
Then the No. 12 overall pick of the 2020 NBA Draft reminded depressed Cleveland believers and the Sacramento Kings – Haliburton’s original team – about the perils of getting it wrong in pro sports.
“For me, I just control what I can, man,” Haliburton said.
“And, yeah, overrate that.”
Indiana trailed by 20 points and still triumphed, because of Haliburton.
The team that won an Eastern Conference-best 64 games during the regular season is now two defeats away from being kicked out of the playoffs, because of the former Iowa State guard who was traded away with Buddy Hield in 2022.
“Ty hit another amazing shot to win the game,” Indiana head coach Rick Carlisle said.
“You don’t see this very often, let alone twice in one week.
“Tyrese, he came through again. We’re very fortunate.”
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Haliburton, not Mitchell, was the strongest pro on the hardwood.
The face of the Pacers has continually learned from his past falls and kept moving forward.
“We spent like a month, 40 days together, and I left with nothing,” said Haliburton, referring to a highly disappointing run for the United States men’s national basketball team that ended with fourth place at the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup.
He won gold in Paris last summer, then created space at the top of the key in Game 2 to sink a 3 that was loaded with self-belief.
“We don’t give up and we’re battle tested,” Haliburton said. “We just find a way.”
All the way to the Eastern Conference finals, and now Indiana gets to wait for its next playoff opponent while Mitchell tries to figure out what exactly happened.
“We let the city down,” Mitchell said. “What hurts is that we didn’t get it done at home.”
