NBA Finals Game 2: Pacers at Thunder, 8 p.m., Sunday; TV: ABC

OKLAHOMA CITY – Tyrese Haliburton heard the scorn during the offseason. He read the mockery at the start of the 2024-25 season.

The Indiana Pacers ’ run to the Eastern Conference Finals last season was a fluke. They beat up the injury-riddled Milwaukee Bucks and New York Knicks to get there.

“As a group, like I've said many times, after you have a run like last year and you get swept in the Eastern Conference Finals, and all the conversation is about how you don't belong there and how you lucked out to get there, and that it was a fluke, guys are going to be pissed off,” Haliburton said. “We're going to spend the summer pissed off.”

Then the Pacers started this season 10-15 .

“You come into the year with all th

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