"Don't settle for passing the ball and getting people involved" - Jay Williams urges Tyrese Haliburton to be more selfish vs. Thunder originally appeared on Basketball Network .
Tyrese Haliburton has been the talk of the 2025 NBA playoffs because of his incredible shot-making late in games. With four improbable game-winners this postseason, many have started talking about Haliburton as one of the best clutch shooters in the league.
But while no one is questioning Haliburton's clutch gene, ESPN's Jay Williams called out the Indiana Pacers guard for waiting for crucial moments to unleash his offense.
According to Williams, if the Pacers want to beat the Oklahoma City Thunder in the 2025 NBA Finals, Haliburton must be aggressive from the start and maintain his appetite for scoring throughout the entire game.
"Haliburton can close games, but champions open the game with intent and they set the tone; they don't just react to it… I need him to look at the rim at the beginning of the game," he said.
The Pacers are 32-3 this season, including 7-0 in the playoffs when Haliburton scores more than 20 points.
In Game 1 of the series against the Thunder, he only scored 14 points and took 13 shots. But the game-winning jumper overshadowed everything.
"I know that they got one on the road, but you can make a case that if he didn't hit that game-winner after Game 1, we'd be talking about the same tone. He wasn't aggressive. And this Indiana team is better when he comes out and attacks; just don't settle for passing the ball and getting people involved," Williams said on ESPN's "Get Up" program.
Going into the fourth quarter of Game 2, Haliburton only had five points on 2-7 shooting in 26 minutes of action. He scored 12 points in the first eight minutes of the final period to try to rally his team, but by then, the Thunder were already comfortably ahead, and his points were meaningless.
Meanwhile, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander has been the opposite. He scored 19 points in the first half of Game 1 and finished with 38. The 2025 NBA MVP had 15 points on 11 shots in the first half of Game 2 and was clearly the aggressor from start to finish.
Through the first two games of the Finals series, Gilgeous-Alexander has already taken 51 field goal attempts, almost twice as many as Haliburton.
But some of that has to do with the team's offensive philosophies.
While Gilgeous-Alexander is the focal point of the Thunder's offense, Indiana's randomness allows anybody on the floor to lead the team in scoring. Some nights, that's Pascal Siakam . Other times, Myles Turner , Aaron Nesmith and Andrew Nembhard have big scoring games, and Haliburton has been more than willing to let his teammates shine.
Still, if there is a time to be selfish, it would be in the NBA Finals, especially given how much credit Haliburton deserves for the Pacers' unexpected run.
Playmaking is great. Setting up teammates is amazing. Pushing the pace and always looking for an open man is what basketball is all about. But at this point in the season, the Pacers might need their star player to be more of a scorer.
This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Jun 10, 2025, where it first appeared.
