‘We know we belong’: Tyrese Haliburton, Pacers lament missed opportunities in loss to Celtics

BOSTON — Less than 30 minutes after his team’s 133-128 overtime loss in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals, Indiana Pacers All-Star point guard Tyrese Haliburton sat at the postgame podium, lamenting three plays from his team’s agonizing defeat. One of those plays, the final play of the fourth quarter, continued to linger.

“That’s replayed in my head a hundred times already and it’ll replay after I get out of here, but I can’t dwell on it,” Haliburton said following a 25-point, 10-assist performance. “I felt like that was probably the look for me to shoot and wish I did, but I didn’t.”

To be clear, from a process standpoint, Haliburton did his job on the final play. With 5.7 seconds remaining in a tie game, he took the final shot. He gave his team a chance to win the game, while also not putting his team at risk of losing the game by taking a shot too early and giving possession back to the Celtics. The shot just didn’t go in.

But as he detailed following the game, Haliburton couldn’t help but think that a deep 3-point attempt shortly after catching the inbounds pass would have had a much better chance of going in than his off-balance, double-pumped attempt just before the buzzer five seconds later.

And he may be right.

With 6.2 seconds remaining before the end of the second quarter, the Pacers ran an inbounds play that quickly put the ball in Haliburton’s hands and the Pacers guard attempted a 35-foot 3-point shot. He knocked that shot down with 1.8 seconds remaining before halftime.

But also consider Haliburton’s buzzer-beater at the end of the third quarter.

With 3.4 seconds, the Pacers inbounded the ball to Haliburton. He took one dribble and thought he was going to have an open look, but Jaylen Brown shut down his space. After a few pivots, the Pacers guard dipped past Brown, leaped, double-pumped and threw in a 29-footer off the glass as the buzzer expired.

Hitting the shot at the end of the second quarter showed that Haliburton might have been right to think that he should have taken a deep 3 with five seconds remaining. But hitting the shot at the end of the third quarter showed that Haliburton is capable of hitting tough, leaning shots that take all of the possible time off the clock. In general, making sure your opponent does not get another chance to score is the priority in a tie game at that stage.

Haliburton contemplating whether the shot he took at the end of regulation was the right one may not be all that productive of an activity, but it is certainly going to be tough for the Pacers to not dwell on the missed opportunity of stealing Game 1 with a win on the road in Boston.

“Really, really tough pill to swallow,” Pacers guard T.J. McConnell told The Athletic. “Knowing how close we were to getting that game (sighs), it’s difficult, but we have to move on and come with the same intensity and mindset in Game 2.”

“We gave it away,” Pacers wing Aaron Nesmith said. “We should have won the game.”

That is where the other two mistakes Haliburton lamented during his postgame news conference come into the picture. Those two mistakes were far more controllable and thus, far more meaningful moving forward.

With 36.7 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter, Pacers guard Andrew Nembhard secured a defensive rebound with the Pacers up by three. To get to that point, the Pacers had erased a 13-point second-half deficit by playing like the more composed team.

As the Celtics struggled to score in the fourth quarter, the Pacers manipulated defenders and put themselves in advantageous positions.

Pascal Siakam, as he has throughout the Pacers’ postseason run, served as a calming presence and scored 10 of his 24 points in the fourth quarter. Repeatedly, Haliburton found Siakam at the free throw line and the Pacers’ midseason acquisition showed why the organization believed he could be a difference maker for them with midrange jumpers to score points in half court situations.

After the Celtics worked to take away those looks for Siakam, the Pacers went to Nembhard working against Celtics center Al Horford. All postseason, Nembhard has looked cool under pressure and he did it again on Tuesday, hitting two massive shots in isolation against Horford to help the Pacers maintain their lead late in the game.

Following Nembhard’s second clutch bucket with 46.8 seconds remaining to give the Pacers a 117-114 lead, Celtics star Jayson Tatum missed an open, top-of-the-key 3 with 36.7 seconds remaining and Nembhard grabbed the rebound. He pitched it ahead to Haliburton, who looked to push in transition and then bounced the ball off his right leg. Nesmith tried to save it, but it was too late.

“I don’t know, there was like three different occasions where I dribbled the ball off my foot today,” Haliburton said. “I don’t know what happened. It’s frustrating because that’s not something that happens normally for me and nobody forced it, I just dribbled the ball off my foot. So (it’s) frustrating, to say the least, but I’ll learn from it, and I’ll be better in Game 2.”