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Pacers' Tyrese Haliburton Vows to 'Go Crazy' vs. Knicks, Josh Hart

Tyrese Haliburton is looking forward to doing battle with current Team USA compatriot Josh Hart when the New York Knicks and Indiana Pacers face off later this season.

Geoff Magliocchetti

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If you won't join them, beat them. 

That's the philosophy Tyrese Haliburton is taking into the 2023-24 NBA season and he's prepared to center his All-Star-branded wrath upon Josh Hart and the New York Knicks. 

Haliburton and Hart are coming off the bench for the United States' men's national basketball team as it prepares to embark upon a quest for gold at the FIBA Basketball World Cup in Asia. National pride has temporarily cast the Knicks-Pacers rivalry aside but Haliburton made it clear he has New York's visits circled on the newly-updated NBA calendar.

During halftime of Team USA's Sunday exhibition against Germany, the last of five World Cup tune-ups, game broadcaster Fox Sports aired clips from the group's first practices held on the campus of the University of Nevada-Las Vegas. Haliburton was wearing a microphone for the practice sessions and engaged in a lively conversation with Hart during a shootaround, one centered upon the three upcoming meetings between their respective employers.

"Did I play against the Knicks all year while you were there, or no?" Haliburton asks Hart, who came to New York in a February trade with the Portland Trail Blazers. When Hart replies in the negative, Haliburton happily declares that the former Pacific Northwesterner's prescience means that "now (he's) going to go crazy against the Knicks!"

Per the 2023-24 NBA regular season schedule, hot off the presses, the first of three meetings between the Knicks and Pacers will be staged at Gainbridge Fieldhouse on Dec. 30. Indiana visits Madison Square Garden on Feb. 1 and 10 to wrap up the set.

Haliburton is fresh off his first season in Indiana, which also featured his first All-Star berth. In two appearances against the Knicks, both coming before Hart's arrival, Haliburton totaled 30 points and 17 assists but New York prevailed in both meetings , which saw Indiana's franchise face shoot just over 39 percent from the field. 

Hart is skeptical, but Haliburton reminds him that his team was "cooked" by Indiana in a prior meeting. Fortunately for Knicks fans, Hart realizes that Haliburton is referencing the Pacers' Jan. 6 victory over the Trail Blazers. 

"I couldn't make a shot the whole game," Haliburton recalls. "But we won, though!"

In that game, a 108-99 Indiana win, Haliburton shot 5-of-15 from the field but he managed to dish out 12 assists and contribute 15 points to the effort. For his part, Hart sank all four of his attempts from the field and pulled in 12 rebounds to form a double-double of his own. 

Hart faced the Pacers twice as a member of the Knicks at the end of the regular season but Haliburton did not play as the contests were broadly meaningless. The Knicks were locked into the fifth season on the Eastern Conference playoff bracket while the Pacers were denied a postseason ticket for the third consecutive season. With the Knicks resting several regulars, Hart made what is, to date, his only start as a New Yorker on April 5, as he pulled in a dozen more boards in a 138-129 win in Indianapolis.

Haliburton already has plenty of reasons to take things personally against the Knicks: last season's first meeting, staged in December, gave birth to a rivalry between Haliburton and MSG Network analyst Wally Szczerbiak, who referred to the former Sacramento King as "Mr. Supposed, Wannabe, Fake All-Star" when he shot 5-of-16 from the field in a 109-106 Knicks victory. 

World Cup play will apparently fulfill one of Hart's basketball dreams: having been partly credited for bringing former Villanova teammate Donte DiVincenzo to New York (joining fellow New Yorker and Team USA rep Jalen Brunson), Hart seemed intent on luring Haliburton over, telling him to "take (his) call" while he was posting on Twitter (now X) after signing a $260 million extension with the Pacers.

For the time being, Hart and Haliburton are set to put their differences aside as Team USA chases World Cup riches. Having completed their five-game tune-up slate with a Sunday win over Germany, the Americans open pool play in Manila on Saturday against New Zealand (8:40 a.m. ET, ESPN2). 

Geoff Magliocchetti is on Twitter @GeoffJMags

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Geoff Magliocchetti
GEOFF MAGLIOCCHETTI

Editor-In-Chief at All Knicks

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