Haliburton scores 32, Pacers hold off Doncic, Mavs, 124-122

DALLAS (AP)— Tyrese Haliburton scored 32 points and won a duel of birthdayboys with Luka Doncic, leading the Indiana Pacers to a 124-122victory over the Dallas Mavericks on Tuesday night.

Doncic had39 points and nine rebounds on his 24th birthday but fell to 1-4 ingames with Kyrie Irving since the superstars were paired in a dealwith Brooklyn before the trade deadline.

Irvingscored 16 points, but his 3-pointer just before the buzzer was thelast of five misses in the final 1:20 with Dallas trailing bytwo.

The23-year-old Haliburton, born on Feb. 29, 2000, was 9 of 18 from thefield and 12 of 15 on free throws while adding seven rebounds andsix assists.

MylesTurner scored 24 points with several big fourth-quarter bucketsagainst his hometown team. He also had four blocks, including oneeach on Doncic and Irving in the second half.

A secondconsecutive loss for the Mavericks came two days after they allowedthe biggest comeback in the NBA this season, squandering a 27-pointlead in a 111-108 loss to Los Angeles Lakers.

The Pacerswon their second straight road game after going two months withoutone, an 11-game skid. They are just 5-17 since reaching aseason-high five games over .500 on Jan. 8.

Indianacoach Rick Carlisle won in his second trip to Dallas since a13-year run as coach of the Mavs, which included the 2011championship. The Pacers lost 132-105 last season.

Dallas cuta nine-point deficit with four minutes remaining to one butcouldn’t finish the rally.

AfterAndrew Nembhard missed two free throws with 7.6 seconds left, theMavericks ran a play for Irving without Doncic touching the ball.Irving’s 3 bounced off the rim, leaving him 0 of 4 from deep.

TIP-INS

Pacers: Themorning shootaround was at Buddy Hield’s Dallas home, where theIndiana guard built a practice court. Players weren’t aware of theplan when the bus headed away from the arena. “The people that knowDallas are like, ‘What’s going on here?’ So, we pull up. And it wasgreat,” Carlisle said. ... A 70-point first half became a 69-59lead when a Haliburton 3-pointer was changed to a 2.

Mavericks:This was the first of consecutive games against teams Dallas hasn’tseen this season. The Pacers and Philadelphia will be consecutiveroad opponents on a five-game trip that starts in late March. ...Maxi Kleber, who had been out since Dec. 12 with a torn hamstring,had a driving one-handed dunk for his first bucket and made hisfirst 3, but he had one of the five misses from deep late. Hescored nine points.

UPNEXT

Pacers: AtSan Antonio on Thursday, with the Spurs going for their firsttwo-game season sweep since 2016-17.

Mavericks:The visit from the 76ers on Thursday features the league’s top twoscorers in Doncic and Joel Embiid.