NBA Hoops

Haliburton has 19 points, Pacers rally to beat Rockets 99-91

Haliburton has 19 points, Pacers rally to beat Rockets 99-91

HOUSTON (AP) — Tyrese Haliburton had 19 points and the Indiana Pacers overcame a huge early deficit to beat the Houston Rockets 99-91 on Friday night.

Myles Turner added 17 points and Jalen Smith had a career-high 18 rebounds as the Pacers won their third straight game on a night where coach Rick Carlisle was ejected before halftime for yelling at the officials.

A 4-0 run by the Rockets cut the lead to 5 with about two minutes to go. They had two chances to get closer but turned the ball over before Jabari Smith Jr. missed 3. A layup by Haliburton after that made it 96-89 with less than a minute remaining.

“That wasn’t the prettiest game (but) our guys were resilient after a horrendous start,” Pacers assistant coach Lloyd Pierce said.

Pierce said the Pacers never got down despite the huge hole they were in early.

“There was never a moment where we thought we were out of it,” he said.

Houston led by one with about 10 minutes left in the fourth quarter before Haliburton got hot, scoring the next eight points to put the Pacers on top 82-75. Haliburton started the run with a 3-point play before knocking down a 3-pointer.

Smith made a jump shot for the Rockets, but Indiana used a 5-0 run after that to make it 87-77 with five minutes to go.

A modest 6-2 spurt by Houston cut the lead to 6. But Andrew Nembhard made a 3-pointer to start a 5-2 run to make it 94-85 with 2:40 left.

Eric Gordon had a season-high 24 points for the Rockets, who were unable to build on Wednesday night’s win over Dallas despite their strong start.

“It wasn’t like we weren’t getting the ball to the right spot,” Houston coach Stephen Silas said. “It wasn’t like we weren’t getting the ball to the rim. We just weren’t making the shots that could carry us over over the hump.”

Houston led as many as 20 early and was up 63-56 after a dunk by Kenyon Martin Jr. with about 5 1/2 minutes left in the third quarter.

Pierce said the entire bench was upset about Haliburton not getting a foul call in the second quarter on the play that led to Carlisle’s ejection.

“To have a no call at the rim was frustrating,” he said. “He gets the first tech and probably gets emotional on the second one.”

With the way things were going for Indiana at that time, Pierce said it made sense that Carlisle got so upset about the call.

“We needed every break that we could get so to not have that called was one of those that we had to fight for,” he said.

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