9 three-pointers + 16 assists! After Curry, the league has another epoch-making point guard
The NBA has now reached a time for star iteration. Nowadays, young stars have risen one after another, and the older generation of stars such as James, Curry, and Durant are still the mainstays of the league, but it is undeniable that they may not be in the league in a few years. So is there anyone in the younger generation who can take them over and create a new era? James' current successor may be inconclusive, but there is one player who is infinitely close to Curry's youthful performance. He may even become another epoch-making point guard in the league after Curry, and that player is Haliburton, the star of the Pacers.
In the Pacers' away game against the Hawks today, Haliburton once again put up phenomenal statistics, scoring 37 points and 16 assists, including 9-of-15 from beyond the three-point line. And Haliburton has played such explosive statistics more than once this season, in the recent game against the 76ers, he also cut 33 points, 15 assists and 0 turnovers, and he averaged 12 assists per game this season, ranking first in the league. What's even more terrifying is that Haliburton is shooting 51.8 percent from the field and 45.8 percent from three-point range this season, making 3.7 three-pointers per game.
These numbers are a reminder that a new epoch-making point guard is about to be born. Haliburton has a good chance of becoming another epoch-making point guard in the league after Curry. This year's Haliburton is only 23 years old, and Curry is not even as luxurious as Haliburton when he is 23 years old, and Haliburton is indeed much better than Curry in terms of assists. And his shooting grasp and shooting percentage are also comparable to Curry back then. Now Haliburton lacks a player like Thompson back then, and Hield is also a top pitcher, but his defensive ability is not strong and cannot compete with Thompson back then. So this also leads to the Pacers' overall defense to a certain extent.
This season, the Pacers are the 29th in the league in defensive efficiency per game. Although they are first in the league in offensive efficiency and first in assists, they are only in sixth place in the East because they do not have good defensive efficiency. If the Pacers have a good defensive setup, they can become one of the top teams in the league based on their points per game and assist efficiency. Of course, this is also a necessary process for a weak team to turn into a strong team, and in the future, with the improvement of the team's lineup, the Pacers according to the Haliburton system may slowly become a strong team in the East.
We're glad that there's finally one player in the league who can replace Curry as one of the top point guards in the future. Although Haliburton's three-point shooting ability is not as strong as Curry's, he is also a top three-point shooter, and more importantly, he can rush, shoot, and has super assist ability, and the three-point shooting rate is very high. Ten years later, his career stats may be shocking.