Tyrese Haliburton Wanted Giannis on Him for Game 5 Winner During Finals Run

Giannis Antetokounmpo had five fouls when he ended up guarding Tyrese Haliburton on the final possession of overtime in Game 5 of the 2025 first-round series between the Indiana Pacers and Milwaukee Bucks.

Gary Trent Jr. had the assignment first. Haliburton told Reggie Miller he wanted Antetokounmpo instead in a 30-minute video released Thursday, in which the two broke down their biggest playoff shots on a court.

Haliburton planned to string Antetokounmpo along and isolate him.

"He had five fouls," Haliburton said. "In that moment, that's all I'm thinking. And again, that's a situation of the game is just going the right way. Momentum is everything in basketball. So I'm like, if I get him out, string him along, and they're giving me the opportunity to iso, just get to what I want to get to."

"I was thinking he was going to cut me off. I was going to have to step back to my right hand," Haliburton continued. "I just saw the lane open and just went from there."

Milwaukee led 118-111 with 34.6 seconds left in overtime on April 29, 2025. Andrew Nembhard hit a 3-pointer, then stole Trent's inbounds pass near the sideline. Haliburton scored on a three-point play to make it 118-117. The NBA's Last Two Minute Report said the next day that the foul called on AJ Green on that play was incorrect.

Trent fumbled a long pass out of bounds with 10.8 seconds left. Haliburton got the ball on the left wing, set him up going left, and drove right past Antetokounmpo for the layup with 1.3 seconds remaining. Indiana won 119-118 and took the series 4-1.

Brook Lopez was on the bench, Haliburton said.

"I think he just came here, but there was no rim protection," Haliburton explained. "Brook wasn't in the game, no bigs. So I have the rim protector out, so he's gonna have to go block it at the rim, if anything, and I put it on the backboard with some time, so if he did block it, there'd be time for other guys to get it."

"I'm not thinking when I drive, 'Oh, he's about to whop this,'" Haliburton added. "I'm just thinking score. But yeah, that whole run, definitely special. All those moments are something I think about pretty often."

Bucks coach Doc Rivers said afterward that his team came out of a timeout with a foul to give and never used it. Nembhard finished with 15 points, Myles Turner had 21 points and nine rebounds, and Aaron Nesmith added 19 points and 12 rebounds.

Antetokounmpo finished with 30 points, 20 rebounds, and 13 assists. Trent scored 33 and made eight 3-pointers, four of them in overtime. Haliburton had 26 points and improved to 9-0 in home playoff games. Milwaukee played the game without Damian Lillard, who tore his left Achilles tendon in Game 4.

Haliburton celebrated on top of the scorer's table. Behind him, his father, John Haliburton, walked onto the court waving a towel with his son's face on it and confronted Antetokounmpo, who called it disrespectful afterward. John Haliburton apologized on X within hours. Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said the next morning that John had been contrite and called him a man with a heart of gold.

Miller pointed out that someone pulled John back while the game was still going. Haliburton knows exactly who it was.

"100% was my mom. I had to look. Had to be my mom," Haliburton said. "Because he just gets so caught up in the moment. Which is OK."

"It's special. All that stuff was fun for us," Haliburton noted. "It's just part of it."

Indiana eliminated Milwaukee in the first round for the second straight year. It was the Bucks' third consecutive first-round exit.

A torn right Achilles in the last game of that postseason kept Haliburton off the floor for all of 2025-26. He captained a team at the Pacers Foundation Charity Softball Classic in August and told reporters there he could not wait to get back on the floor. Pacers training camp opens Sept. 29, and the regular season starts Oct. 21 at New Orleans.