Incredible start by Haliburton isn’t enough
SALT LAKE CITY – Tyrese Haliburton started the NBA all-star three-point contest in record fashion but he couldn’t close the deal in finishing third behind champion Damian Lillard and teammate Buddy Hield.
Haliburton tied a three-point contest record with 31 points in his first round but finished with 17 in the final.
“It felt good but I choked in the end,” he said with a grin. “I just choked.”
But, the rough finish didn’t diminish the experience for him.
“Book Tyrese next year,” he said. “I’ll be in the contest next year. I’m going to get this back. I’m going to get it back for sure.”
And while the competition took place at Vivint Arena in Utah, Milwaukee and Oshkosh went at head-to-head in the opening rounds as Tyler Herro was also in the competition. But Herro said that there were no home state bragging rights on the line between the two guards.
“No, I mean he’s here for a better reason than me,” the Whitnall High School alumnus said. “I’m here for the threepoint contest, he’s the all-star. So, that’s the ultimate dream is to be an all-star. So at the end of the day all the love goes to him and I’m very happy for him. We’ve been playing with each other since third grade, so he’s always been back-andforth, competitive, that’s just who we are, that’s why we’re here.”
Haliburton said the pair took a moment on the bench to reflect how far they’ve come together since their younger days in Wisconsin.
“We played AAU together from sixth grade to eighth grade, obviously a guy that will hold me accountable on my development as a basketball player and I hope I do the same for him,” Haliburton said. “We push each other. We don’t communicate a ton these days but we see what each other’s doing and I think we both use that push each other.”
Sacramento’s Kevin Huerter, Boston’s Jayson Tatum, Utah’s Lauri Markkanen and New York’s Julius Randle also participated.
Herro said he finally got in some practice moving around the racks of balls earlier in the day and acknowledged it’s the first time he’s done that. He did say there is a strategy with which balls to start to get into a rhythm, but when the competition started he couldn’t quite catch a rhythm and finished with 16 points.