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Tyrese Haliburton Pulled Out Reggie Miller’s Choke Celebration a Bit Too Early

Tyrese Haliburton was a tad too eager to recreate one of the most infamous moments in the history of Madison Square Garden.

Tyler Lauletta

Tyrese Haliburton does choke celebration.
Tyrese Haliburton does choke celebration. / @NBAonTNT
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Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals between the Indiana Pacers and New York Knicks appeared to be heading towards a pretty ho-hum finish.

While the game had been tightly contested for most of the night, the Knicks pulled away in the fourth quarter and had a 14-point lead with three minutes to play.

But Pacers forward Aaron Nesmith had other thoughts, going absolutely unconscious from beyond the arc to bring Indiana back into contention possession by possession. As the Knicks got nervier and nervier, a few foul shots were missed, and suddenly, the Pacers had the ball, trailing by just two points with seven seconds to play.

Despite Nesmith’s heroics, the ball went to the hands of the team’s leader, Tyrese Haliburton, who has had a knack for coming up with a big shot when the team needed it.

Haliburton drove the lane, but bailed, and ran back to the three-point line, appearing to go for the win. His shot went up, hit off the back of the rim to launch comically high in the air, and came down with a swish through the net.

The Pacers on the court erupted, and Haliburton immediately grabbed at his neck, recreating the iconic choke celebration that Reggie Miller demonized the Knicks with so many years ago.

There was just one problem—the game wasn’t over yet. As replays would show, Haliburton’s foot was on the line. What he thought was a game-winner was just a shot to force overtime.

Miller was on the call for TNT, as was Stan Van Gundy, who pointed out that when Miller pulled out the celebration, it had been for the win, not the tie.

Luckily for Haliburton, he and the Pacers were able to avoid disaster. After an extremely tense overtime period, Indiana was able to pull out the win.

Haliburton was right—the Knicks choked. He just called it a bit early.

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Tyler Lauletta
TYLER LAULETTA

Tyler Lauletta is a staff writer for the Breaking and Trending News Team/team at Sports Illustrated. Before joining SI, he covered sports for nearly a decade at Business Insider, and helped design and launch the OffBall newsletter. He is a graduate of Temple University in Philadelphia, and remains an Eagles and Phillies sicko. When not watching or blogging about sports, Tyler can be found scratching his dog behind the ears.

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