INDIANAPOLIS — Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton will play in Sport 6 of the NBA Finals on Thursday night time, coach Rick Carlisle introduced.
Haliburton had been a game-time determination after he strained his proper calf in Sport 5, however the crew put him by means of a energy check throughout a crew walk-through a couple of hours earlier than the sport, which Carlisle mentioned he got here by means of properly.
“There is not any set minutes restrict,” Carlisle mentioned previous to the sport. “We are going to watch and monitor issues very carefully from the start of the sport by means of everything of the sport and we’ll go from there.”
The Pacers are trailing the collection 3-2 making an attempt to pressure a Sport 7, which might be Sunday night time in Oklahoma Metropolis. Haliburton had acknowledged he needed to do “all the things in his energy” to play in Thursday’s must-win recreation, which included a wide-range of remedies – hyperbaric chambers, needles, therapeutic massage, digital stimulation, particular tape — to assist his strained proper calf, a analysis that was confirmed by an MRI examination Tuesday.
Throughout his pregame warmup earlier than Sport 6, he wore a gray compression sleeve on his proper leg, which sat slightly below his knee.
He had been coping with a decrease proper leg harm all through the collection, however the calf pressure worsened in Sport 5 though he remained within the recreation to play 34 minutes. Nonetheless, Haliburton didn’t rating a area aim and tied a playoff profession low with 4 factors as Indiana dropped the sport.
Haliburton is averaging 15.0 factors, 7.2 assists and 6.2 rebounds on 45% taking pictures by means of the primary 5 video games of the collection.
“We obtained a job to do tonight,” Carlisle mentioned. “We have to get able to battle a crew that has been the most effective crew within the league all 12 months lengthy. It is a powerful recreation. It is an elimination recreation. There’s so much happening.”