This week, we officially learned that Gregg Popovich will not return to coaching the San Antonio Spurs; inspired by phone calls to all the players from Coach Tyronn Lue, the Los Angeles Clippers staved off elimination; and Jalen Brunson’s late dagger knocked the upstart Pistons out of the playoffs. Other Fantasy basketball related stories we’re tracking include…

Tyrese Haliburton Finds His Scoring Touch

Back in 2021-22 the Indiana Pacers bottomed out with a 25-win season — among the worst campaigns in franchise history — but have progressively gotten better since. The following season, Indy improved by 10 wins before increasing to 47 total victories in 2023-24 (and returning to the playoffs). This season, the Pacers reached 50 wins for the first time since 2013-14 and proved they mean business by dispatching the Bucks in surprisingly easy fashion.

Their reward? A date with the East’s top team, the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Indiana is a well-rounded squad without any major weaknesses. The Pacers really know how to make the extra pass, leading the NBA in assists per game, a trait which facilitated a lot of easy looks (second in the NBA in FG percentage). Their defense isn’t top tier, ranking 13th in points allowed per game, but that’s probably not a fatal flaw.

In Tuesday’s series-clinching win over Milwaukee, Tyrese Haliburton came through in the clutch as the Bucks couldn’t take care of the basketball. His driving layup with 1.3 seconds on the clock in overtime capped an 8-0 run to give Indiana the lead and a 119-118 victory. Haliburton enjoyed his best scoring game of the series (26 points), while doing more than usual in boards (five), blocks (three) and steals (three). And his ability to will the Pacers to home playoff wins continues as he’s now a perfect 9-0 in his career in this regard.

Haliburton had been dropping dimes like nobody’s business all series, but had generally underwhelmed in the scoring department, so this was a welcome sight. In fact, his bucket count has dipped in recent seasons, but he made up for that with a career-best three treys per game in 2024-25.

Somewhat injury prone in recent seasons, Haliburton is no stranger to getting in opponents’ faces, but has nothing on his old man, who can obviously more than hold his own in the trash talking game. It was bad enough that dad won’t be allowed to attend Pacers’ games for the foreseeable future, but at least Tyrese was chill about it all (see video below).

Back to the younger Haliburton, he’s pretty large for a point guard and passing is definitely his best skill. When drafted, there were questions about his strength, but it has clearly not held him back.

A Bright Spot in Brooklyn

The Brooklyn Nets last made the playoffs in 2022-23 on the strength of a 45-win effort, but it’s been all downhill since. They dropped to 32 wins in 2023-24 and then just 26 this season as it was a full-court press to tank.

Unfortunately, Brooklyn isn’t even that good at tanking as several teams managed worse records, leaving the Nets at +850 to get the No. 1 overall pick in the NBA Draft as per FanDuel.

This team was actually pretty good defensively (10th in points allowed per game), but struggled to score (29th in PPG) thanks to some awful shooting (29th in FG percentage). Rebounding was a major weakness, as well.

One bright spot for the Nets was the play of the veritable unknown Tyrese Martin, especially down the stretch. After failing to make much of an impact as a rookie with Atlanta in 2022-23, he spent all of last season in the G-League. The Nets signed him in September and he showed well enough to have his training camp deal upgraded to a two-way contract and ultimately a standard deal.

In the season finale, Martin scored 20 points (for the second time in five games) and averaged over 11 points in March as his bucket count rose significantly over the final few weeks. In seeing his most action ever, he did a better job of getting to the line and even flashed some offensive rebounding prowess (for a guard).

There’s no guarantee the rebuilding Nets will pick up their team option on him for 2025-26, but if that happens the UConn product showed enough in his second season that he should land another gig somewhere else.

Waiver Wire Pick of the Week

Ty Jerome, PG, Cleveland Cavaliers (ESPN: 12.8 per cent; CBS: 35 per cent): Very early this season, we recommended Jerome as we were impressed by what he was doing in limited minutes. And sure enough, his PT rose, as did his production – other than a slump in December. In the first round, Jerome went off, helped by the fact that Darius Garland (toe) missed the last two games. If Garland remains out, Jerome should continue to jack up treys and sink them (52.4 per cent from downtown vs. Miami).

RotoRob Tune of the Day

English folk rock band Fairport Convention started in 1967, took a six-year break in the first half of the ’80s, and remains active today. In 1975, they released their 10th album, Rising for the Moon, which includes the track “Dawn.”