Tyrese Haliburton Reveals How He Judged His First NBA Game in 486 Days

Brad Weber, who coached Tyrese Haliburton at Oshkosh North High School, texted him Wednesday to ask how he planned to grade his first regular-season game in 486 days.

The Indiana Pacers beat the New Orleans Pelicans 123-120 that night at Smoothie King Center. Haliburton played 33 minutes and had 23 points and 12 assists, his first regular-season action since tearing his right Achilles tendon in Game 7 of the 2025 NBA Finals.

Haliburton said he slept well Tuesday night but woke up early Wednesday, eager to get to the arena. He had spent the days before watching other teams open the season, ring night included.

Game shape is still coming for him.

"I think my high school coach, Coach Weber, texted me tonight," Haliburton said, "and said, 'How are you going to grade success tonight? What are you going to do to grade that? Is it winning? Is it scoring a certain number of points?' I told them my goal is to be aggressive four quarters and play the right way. And when stuff gets hard, don't give up. Kind of just try to figure it out."

"I look at tonight as a success for sure," Haliburton continued. "Obviously, we won. I feel like I have a lot to get better at. The biggest thing for me is just getting my wind back, just doing some more after practice and stuff to prepare me for these games."

Weber was a longtime assistant at Oshkosh North and took over as head coach before Haliburton's senior season. He also taught Haliburton's English classes for four years.

That senior season ended with the 2018 WIAA Division 1 state championship, the first in program history.

Haliburton played three preseason games this month. He went 16 minutes, all in the first half, in the Oct. 7 exhibition at Iowa State, his first game in 472 days.

He tweaked his right ankle in Ames and sat out Indiana's next exhibition three days later. Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said the MRI looked good.

Haliburton scored 24 points at Oklahoma City on Oct. 13 in a 114-112 overtime loss. Three nights later, he had 17 points in a little over 20 minutes against Milwaukee, with the starters sitting the second half.

Wednesday was the first time he played more than 30 minutes in 16½ months, according to Carlisle.

Dejounte Murray played 34 minutes for New Orleans on Wednesday and scored 23 points. Haliburton has leaned on Murray, who tore his own right Achilles tendon on Jan. 31, 2025.

"The thing that's made me feel most like normal is falling and our whole team not panicking," Haliburton explained. "I think that's made me feel the most normal. So I think I was just on the ground. I just needed to breathe a little bit. I was tired as hell. But talking with Dejounte and obviously the other guys who have went through this, everybody's been big on just, like, 'Give yourself some grace. It's going to take some time to get your wind back.'"

"You can do all the sprinting, track workouts, hard workouts you want," Haliburton added. "There's nothing, like, game-shaped. And so it'll come with time. And yeah, that baptism by fire is good. So it's just kind of good for me to figure it out on the floor."

Through three quarters Wednesday, Haliburton was 4-of-11 from the field. All 4 of his attempts in the fourth quarter went in.

His first basket of the night was a short jumper off an Andrew Nembhard pass with 9:50 left in the first quarter. Haliburton said a layup early on opened everything up for him.

The preseason taught him not to press and to let the game come to him.

"I thought I closed the game really well," Haliburton said. "You guys know who I am in the fourth quarter and the way I feel like I'm one of the best closers in this game. So the guys trust me in the end of games to make the right play, and I did that. But I got to do a better job, especially [at the] start [of] that second quarter. [It] was really poor from us as a group. But I just got to do a better job rallying the troops, getting us going."

His 13 fourth-quarter points included a three-point play that broke a 118-118 tie inside the final 1:30.

Haliburton said he planned to watch the film Thursday and get ready for Friday's home opener against the Dallas Mavericks.

Tip-off at Gainbridge Fieldhouse is 7 p.m. ET.