Tyrese Haliburton is forever golden
Tyrese Haliburton is forever golden
On Indiana Pacers guard Tyrese Haliburton's golden Olympic experience, embracing his role, valuing the experience and finally winning big. Plus, his fire tweet.
Tyrese Haliburton is now an Olympic gold medalist.
USA Basketball had his full commitment back before they even requested it, saying last September, at the start of training camp, that he was “in” for the Paris Olympics. Of course, they had to formally ask him first.
It wasn’t until April when an official invitation was extended to him and to the other 11 players on Team USA. He accepted. Not even multiple injuries, first in January and then in May, could keep him down. He took four weeks off after the NBA season and then locked in with two-a-days leading up to USA training camp.
“How can you not want to do this?” he said beforehand. “We watched our role models and guys that we look up to represent USA basketball, and I knew I wanted to be a part of that. I wanted to be a part of that because people I looked up to were part of that and the people they looked up to were part of that.
“And I think the great part about USA basketball is there’s a gold standard.”
And so four months later, in July, he was part of a special team — they embraced the nickname “The Avengers” — that made an undefeated run to the USA’s fifth straight gold medal in men’s basketball.
Team USA escaped France in the final game, 98-87, led by 24 points (and eight 3s) from Steph Curry and 14 points, 10 rebounds from LeBron James on Saturday.
Thirty minutes after having a gold medal placed around his neck, Haliburton fired off a tweet that was more memorable than anything he did on the court in his limited role (which he anticipated all along).
Haliburton tweeted a photo smiling with his gold medal and the caption: “When you ain’t do nun on the group project and still get an A”
Brilliant.
He got to it before anyone else could. Self-deprecating.
He nailed it. And knowing Haliburton, he had this “fire” tweet in his drafts in the week leading up to their gold medal win over France. He’s active on social media and knows what is being said. This way he ended the joke before it even began.
As of Monday, just two days later, the tweet has nearly 27 million views — plus millions more from the aggregators who reshared the image.
His Role
Haliburton knew the deal all along: Be a role player for the team. He embraced it. This was about the team as a whole, and specifically the last dance for the trio of LeBron James, Steph Curry and Kevin Durant.
When Haliburton played, he was going to be off the ball most of the time — very different than what is demanded of him in Indy. He was setting screens, getting teammates in the right position, and sometimes clearing out to the other side.
He could facilitate — but so could every one else on this Hall of Fame roster.
“I joked around last year with (USA managing director) Grant Hill, I'm trying to be Jason Kidd. I'm not trying to see how long I can go without shooting the ball. But I'm excited to be around the guys. I'm excited to be shooting the ball.