{"id":6055,"date":"2025-05-01T22:31:10","date_gmt":"2025-05-01T22:31:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/6055\/"},"modified":"2025-05-01T22:31:10","modified_gmt":"2025-05-01T22:31:10","slug":"tyrese-haliburtons-dad-wont-attend-games-after-giannis-confrontation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/6055\/","title":{"rendered":"Tyrese Haliburton’s dad won’t attend games after Giannis confrontation"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"play\"<\/p>\n

Richard ‘Rip’ Hamilton on all things NBA past and present<\/p>\n

Rip Hamilton chats with Mackenzie Salmon about how the NBA has changed over the years and tells us about his partnership with Pure Michigan.<\/p>\n

Sports Seriously<\/p>\n

John Haliburton, the father of Indiana Pacers<\/a> star guard Tyrese Haliburton, will not attend Pacers home and away games for the foreseeable future as the team gets ready to start a second-round series against the Cleveland Cavaliers<\/a> in the Eastern Conference playoffs.<\/p>\n

That follows an incident in which John Haliburton confronted and exchanged words with Milwaukee Bucks<\/a> All-Star Giannis Antetokounmpo on the court after a game.<\/p>\n

The decision was made by the Pacers\u2019 front office, according to Pacers vice president of basketball communications and media relations Michael Preston.<\/p>\n

John Haliburton had a courtside floor seat at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, and after Tyrese\u00a0made the game-winning shot in the final seconds<\/a> in the Game 5 series clincher, he ran onto the court and had a verbal altercation with Antetokounmpo.<\/p>\n

Tyrese Haliburton admonished his dad\u2019s actions, and John Haliburton apologized<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“I sincerely apologize to Giannis, the Milwaukee Bucks and the Pacers organization for my actions following tonight’s game,”\u00a0John Haliburton posted on social media<\/a>. “This was not a good reflection on our sport or my son and I will not make that mistake again.”<\/p>\n

Said Tyrese Haliburton: “I don’t agree with what transpired there from him. Basketball is basketball and let’s keep it on the court. I think he just got excited, saw his son make a game winner and came on the court, but we had a conversation.”<\/p>\n

Game 1 of the Cavaliers<\/a>-Pacers series is Sunday in Cleveland.<\/p>\n

Tyrese Haliburton’s father confronts Giannis<\/p>\n

After\u00a0Haliburton’s layup with 1.3 seconds remaining in overtime<\/a>\u00a0gave Indiana a 119-118 victory and eliminated the Bucks, John Haliburton and other Pacers fans stormed onto the court.<\/p>\n

Video posted to social media<\/a>\u00a0shows Antetokounmpo standing at the top of the key with his hands on his hips when Haliburton’s father walks around from behind him and holds up a towel with Tyrese’s face on it in front of the dejected Bucks star. A member of the Bucks then steps in between them.<\/p>\n

Moments later, TV cameras captured an animated discussion between the two before Antetokounmpo was ushered away.<\/p>\n

Antetokounmpo’s response to confrontation<\/p>\n

Antetokounmpo was still a little upset\u00a0when asked about the exchange<\/a>\u00a0in a postgame interview.<\/p>\n

\u201c(A)t the moment I thought he was a fan,\u201d he said. \u201cBut then I realize it was Tyrese\u2019s [father]. I love Tyrese. I think he\u2019s a great competitor. [But] it was his dad \u2026 Coming in the floor and showing me his son, a towel with his face, [and saying], \u2018This is what we do. This is what we effing do. This what the eff we do.\u2019 I feel like that\u2019s very, very disrespectful.<\/p>\n

“I’m happy for him, I’m happy for his son, and I’m happy that he’s happy for his son,” Antetokounmpo later added. “That’s how you’re supposed to feel. But coming to me and disrespecting me and cursing at me I think is totally unacceptable, totally unacceptable.”<\/p>\n

Antetokounmpo said their discussion on the floor ended amicably, as evidenced by a thumbs-up gesture he gave as they parted.<\/p>\n

“I talked with him at the end,\u201d Antetokounmpo said, \u201cand I think we\u2019re in a good place.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Richard ‘Rip’ Hamilton on all things NBA past and present Rip Hamilton chats with Mackenzie Salmon about how…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4842,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[108,7,306,305,193,107,123,257,113,126,70,85,6,11,62,67,61,81,114,34,66,83,256,278],"class_list":{"0":"post-6055","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba-playoffs","8":"tag-antetokounmpo","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-cavaliers","11":"tag-cleveland","12":"tag-cleveland-cavaliers","13":"tag-giannis","14":"tag-giannis-antetokounmpo","15":"tag-haliburton","16":"tag-indiana","17":"tag-indiana-pacers","18":"tag-national","19":"tag-national-sports","20":"tag-nba","21":"tag-nba-playoffs","22":"tag-neutral","23":"tag-news","24":"tag-overall","25":"tag-overall-neutral","26":"tag-pacers","27":"tag-playoffs","28":"tag-sports","29":"tag-sports-news","30":"tag-tyrese","31":"tag-tyrese-haliburton"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/114434951315341978","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6055","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6055"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6055\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6055"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6055"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6055"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}