In-season tournament provides added incentive for Haliburton, Pacers

As the NBA prepared to launch its first tournament of the season, the league and commissioner Adam Silver repeatedly emphasized that introducing a cup tournament like those held in Europe would provide teams with an opportunity to win another thing than the Larry O’Brien trophy. in June.

Additionally, with all knockout stage matches broadcast on national television, the tournament would create an opportunity for under-the-radar teams to step into the national spotlight.

In other words, it was created for a team exactly like the Indiana Pacers.

“The season tournament is probably the first time I’ve actually competed to win a championship at the NBA level,” Pacers guard Tyrese Haliburton told ESPN. “I’ve never been to the playoffs or anything, so here it gives me a chance to be able to do it, and it’s exciting for me.

“There’s definitely more juice in these games, and it’s exciting. It’s an exciting time for the league and you know, I think we’re all trying to make the tournament of the season more important because everyone wants there to be meaning in it.”

Indiana has one nationally televised game scheduled this season: Jan. 30 at Boston on TNT. This will actually be the first time in Haliburton’s career that he will appear on the network – unless he can put the Pacers in the quarterfinals of this season’s tournament with a victory against the Atlanta Hawks on Tuesday night , which would win East Group A for the Pacers.

For a Pacers team trying to reestablish itself as an Eastern Conference playoff contender, the chance to play real-stakes games in the first few weeks of the season isn’t something it takes for granted. acquired.

“The opportunities to participate in more meaningful stages is something that is important for young teams,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle told ESPN. “I have played in over 300 playoff games during my career as a player, assistant coach and head coach. For me, my job is to develop the style that helps our group have the best possible chances to win.

“That said, it’s very important to have the opportunity to compete on a more meaningful platform.”

The NBA hopes the season tournament will become a universally accepted event, not just an interesting part of the start of the regular season. The first step to achieving this is getting players and teams to buy in, which was in question this summer when the event was announced. Enter the Pacers, who finished 11th in the East a season ago, five games out of play-in position, and were projected to finish ninth in the East this season, despite the presence of Haliburton, a star a year ago who is averaging a career-high 23.5 points per game this season.

“The buy-in from our teams and players is what will ultimately drive fan interest and help create a new tradition,” Silver told ESPN. “Players around the league, from young rising stars like Tyrese Haliburton to all-time greats like LeBron James and Steph Curry, have spoken out about what’s at stake in these current tournament games season and how that translates to even more competitive play. on the court.”

Haliburton leads the league in assists (11.6 per game), running an offense that plays in a style reminiscent of Steve Nash’s Phoenix Suns “Seven Seconds or Less”; Indiana leads the league in pace and points per 100 possessions. They can still advance to the Round of 16 even if they lose to Atlanta, although it would require a little help from the rest of their group. If they reach the quarterfinals, the league will have the opportunity to introduce one of the most exciting young teams in the league to a new level of interest from casual fans of the sport.

Yet there are many reminders along the way that Indiana remains a work in progress. Even while talking Saturday about his team’s departure and the potential impact of a win against Atlanta, Carlisle warned his group against another young team, the Orlando Magic, in a non-tournament game Sunday.

The Pacers then fell behind by as many as 40 points at home, while the Magic led wire to wire in a rout.

“We have to keep our eye on the ball,” Carlisle said. “But with Tyrese, offensively we can do special things, and defensively we are getting better.”

The Pacers will need to do much better than their current 27th ranking in defensive rating to make the kind of playoff run Haliburton & Co. are ultimately hoping for. They are currently seventh in the East, firmly in the playoffs and play-ins, so they plan to play meaningful basketball in March and April for the first time since 2021, when they lost to the Washington Wizards during play-ins. tournament.

For now, Indiana is simply focused on Tuesday’s game in Atlanta. And for a league that hopes to make this event a cornerstone of the NBA calendar, it has at least managed to get one of its brightest young stars on board with the idea.

“Guys might think, ‘Oh, it’s a long season. If we lose this one, we’ll be fine.’ But I think there’s some value in saying, “No, no, no. Yeah, the season is long. But we want this game, we want it now,” Haliburton said. “I loved this aspect of the season tournament. It’s been a lot of fun.”