Indiana Pacers fans are elated that Tyrese Haliburton plays for their team. Trading for him helped turn the Pacers into an NBA championship contender.
After taking down the Oklahoma City Thunder on Wednesday night, the Pacers are now just two wins away from winning their first NBA title in franchise history.
Haliburton is a big reason why they are in that position. The Pacers may have been able to pull off the trade for him with the Kings, but they weren’t the only team interested in him.
Mark Cuban used to be the majority owner of the Dallas Mavericks before selling his majority stake to Patrick Dumont. Dumont was the one who oversaw the Luka Doncic trade.
Cuban would never have let that happen, but he also wanted to land Tyrese Haliburton. He tried to trade up in the draft to get him, but wasn’t able to.
He regaled this tale on the Pat Bev Podcast, talking about how, when Rick Carlisle was his coach, how much he loved Haliburton even then.
IMAGINE IF THE MAVS GOT TYRESE HALIBURTON pic.twitter.com/n5TNR6AVfs
— Mavs Lead (@MavsLead) June 11, 2025
“Tyrese Haliburton. We did everything we could to trade up and get him. Did everything we could. Now, obviously, Rick was our coach at the time. Rick goes to Indiana. What’s the first deal he does?”
Cuban would have loved to bring Haliburton into Dallas and pair him with Doncic. That would have been something that Mavericks fans would have loved to have seen.
Instead, the Kings drafted Haliburton and eventually traded him to Indiana for Domantas Sabonis, Jeremy Lamb, and Justin Holiday.
While the Pacers got other players in exchange for that deal in addition to Haliburton, the superstar guard is the only player left from that deal on the team.
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The Pacers now have Haliburton as part of their core moving forward. They even signed him to a max contract extension that will keep him as one of the key players for years to come.
Haliburton has proven that he is one of the ten best players in the NBA with what he’s done with this Pacers team. He has brought these players to the brink of an NBA title.
So far this postseason, Haliburton is averaging 18.6 points, 5.9 rebounds, and 9.4 assists per game. He is shooting 47.3 percent from the field and 34.3 percent from beyond the three-point arc.
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