'Man, I (expletive) it up': Why this Game 1 was different for Tyrese Haliburton
BOSTON -- Tyrese Haliburton acknowledged that Tuesday's Game 1 loss hit a little different than any of the Pacers' other playoff losses on both a collective and individual level.
On one hand, there were more positives to take from that loss than any of the five they suffered in the first two rounds against the Bucks or the Knicks. Their Game 1 road performances in both of those series' were ugly, but in Boston they showed the resiliency to withstand a 12-0 run and then rally back from a 13-point third-quarter deficit against a Celtics team that won seven more games than anyone else in the NBA this season and 14 more games than any team in the Eastern Conference.
But on the other hand, every small mistake that led to their collapse in the last 10 seconds of regulation and allowed the Celtics to force overtime, where they eventually won 133-128, stung all the more. And Haliburton contributed several of those. He scored 25 points and posted 10 assists, so he didn't have to face what have been ubiquitous questions about his offensive aggression, but he had three key late turnovers including dribbling off his foot twice. He also had the ball in his hand on the final possession of regulation but passed up an open, but deep, shot early in the play and tried to drive but found himself bottled up on the right elbow and forcing a worse shot that he missed before the buzzer. He's had much worse overall performances, but he also felt more directly responsible for defeat than in any other game.
"It's one of the first playoff games where I really feel like, 'Man, I (expletive) it up," Haliburton said Wednesday in a media availability session at the hotel where the Pacers are staying. "It's on me."
But Haliburton said his playoff experiences so far have taught him how important it is to apply lessons without dwelling on mistakes and beating himself up over them, to compartmentalize in such a way that failure makes him better instead of worse.
"It's film study and not getting high and not getting too low," Haliburton said. "I think that's really the biggest thing for me. I think throughout the course of a series, you're going to have good games and you're going to have bad games. ... Throughout this playoff run I've had some really good games and some of my worst games of the whole season to be honest. It's just understanding that happens through the course of this. Win, lose, good game, bad game. They're all lessons. It's my first playoff run. I'm learning a lot. Yesterday, honestly, it sucks that it happened. But it's good for me. ... It's good to learn. I'm 24. I've got a lot of time but I'm trying to win right now."
The Pacers have tried to operate that way on a collective level also. They are bothered by the 21 turnovers that turned into 32 Celtics points, but they also know those giveaways are uncharacteristic of what they've done all year and all playoffs. They finished with the ninth-fewest turnovers in the league with 12.9 per game, and they led the league in assists and assist-to-turnover ratio at 2.38. Wednesday's performance moved them from second to seventh among playoff teams in turnovers as they went from 10.8 per game to 11.6, but their 30.6 assists per game are the most by a wide margin so they still lead all playoff teams in assist-to-turnover ratio.
Simply put, they know they have to be more careful than they were in Game 1, but they know that's a fixable problem.
"We looked at a lot of the problems that we had today," Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said. "A lot of these are adjustments that aren't complicated. They're just spacing. They're recognition. We've been a very good ball security team all year. We just have to get that fixed. The things that we've done well, we have to continue to do well."
Like Haliburton, Carlisle said the Pacers have to make sure they don't overreact and that they avoid getting too low due to the loss by remembering what they did well. They shot 53.5% from the field and held the Celtics to 47.5%, making six more field goals than Boston did. They won the rebounding battle 44-43 and they got more than twice as much production out of their bench. And as previously noted, they responded with force when they were down by double figures rather than wilt as so many other Celtics opponents have this season.
And Carlisle noted that the Pacers also managed to perform that well in their third game in five days after winning two games against the Knicks in which they were facing elimination, including Game 7 of the Eastern Conference semifinals.
"These are the highs and lows of the playoffs when you get to the Eastern Conference finals," Carlisle said. "We have to regulate all that stuff. We have to see it for how it is and not worse than it is. And we have to make the things better that need to be better. And that's pretty much it."
Importantly, Carlisle said, the Pacers come out of Game 1 knowing they are not out of their league playing against the Celtics. They already had that sense from their regular season meetings. After an embarrassing 155-104 loss in Boston on Nov. 1, they played the Celtics even in the last four games, winning two and losing two with one of the losses coming by just four points.
Playing them that tough in Game 1 in front of a raucous TD Garden crowd more firmly cemented their belief that they have a real chance in this series while also not diminishing their respect for the NBA's top team.
"Our guys know they can compete with any team in the NBA," Carlisle said. "Boston just happens to be exceptionally better based upon their record and statistical things that they've done this year and all that kind of stuff. We respect them and we know we're going to have to play at an extreme high level to win games in this series."
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Pacers Tyrese Haliburton on how to recover from Game 1 loss vs. Celtics
