After a 104-93 loss on Tuesday to a Golden State Warriors crew that was resting “exhausted” prime scorer Stephen Curry, Milwaukee Bucks head coach Doc Rivers held a gathering with superstars Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard, in keeping with NBA insider Chris Haynes, because the Bucks seek for “ways to improve” a crew that has misplaced 5 of its final seven video games within the warmth of a battle for postseason seeding within the Jap Convention.
Haynes’ sources described the assembly as “an open forum” by which all three events might share their factors of view on why Milwaukee’s offense has continued to lavatory down late in video games, and a “productive” session between the coach and gamers tasked with getting the Bucks again to competing for championships after consecutive first-round playoff exits.
[You could win $25K in the Women’s Bracket Mayhem contest. Enter now!]
For the season, the Bucks rank sixth within the NBA in offensive effectivity within the first quarter, tied for tenth within the second quarter, 14th within the third quarter … and useless final within the fourth quarter, scoring simply 105.8 factors per 100 possessions within the remaining body. The struggles develop much more pronounced whenever you focus in on crunch time, with Milwaukee producing a mere 97.1 points-per-100 in “clutch” conditions — when the rating is inside 5 factors within the remaining 5 minutes of the fourth quarter or extra time — whereas taking pictures simply 38.7% from the sector and 30% from 3-point land with almost as many turnovers (38) as assists (44) in these eventualities.
After sputtering for many of the first half in opposition to Golden State, the Bucks roared again within the third quarter, driving the playmaking of Antetokounmpo and scorching taking pictures from Kyle Kuzma and Brook Lopez to erase a 17-point deficit and take a lead into the ultimate minute of the interval earlier than the Warriors answered with a Jimmy Butler-fueled 16-2 Warriors run. The sport was nonetheless within the stability within the clutch, although, with Milwaukee trailing 96-93 with 4 minutes to go — just for the Bucks to attain simply two factors on 0-for-6 taking pictures the remainder of the way in which, stumbling to the end line as Golden State closed out its fifteenth win in 18 video games since buying and selling for Butler and rejuvenating its season:
The Warriors deserve a fair proportion of the credit score for Milwaukee’s late-game struggles in its lowest-scoring outing of the season — most notably Draymond Inexperienced, who completed off a masterclass efficiency in opposition to Antetokounmpo that served as a reminder of simply how phenomenal a defender he stays, eight seasons faraway from his lone Defensive Participant of the 12 months trophy.
Watching these possessions, although, Milwaukee’s general stagnation leaps off the web page.
Giannis clears out the left wing to assault Draymond, with Lillard one move away to occupy Gary Payton II … and all three different Bucks stay stationary as Antetokounmpo goes to work, ending up with a non-rim runner over a superb contest by the most effective defenders on the planet.
Giannis kicks the ball to Dame on the appropriate wing, flashes to the appropriate elbow and calls repeatedly for Taurean Prince to vacate the appropriate nook to attempt to take away Butler from the help-defensive equation on the robust facet. A number of seconds elapse earlier than Prince follows the instruction; Jimmy doesn’t chunk, staying put as a result of Milwaukee’s already all the way down to 10 seconds on the shot clock by the point Antetokounmpo comes as much as attempt to set the ball display for Lillard.
The display try itself goes nowhere, as a result of Giannis by no means really makes contact with Payton, shuffling from his proper hip over towards his left and standing perpendicular to the sideline — an angle that left Dame nowhere to go on his proper, forcing him to reject the display, retreat and attempt to make one thing occur with a tough left-hand dribble at midcourt with seven seconds left on the shot clock. The end result isn’t horrible — a Gary Trent Jr. catch-and-shoot look over a late contest by Brandin Podziemski — however it actually wasn’t Plan A or B out of that motion.
“We didn’t execute [the play], but that wasn’t why we lost the game,” Rivers stated after the sport, in keeping with Eric Nehm of The Athletic. “We didn’t execute most of the game. We’re in an offensive funk right now and we have to get out of it.”
On the subsequent journey, once more, Milwaukee doesn’t even method moving into its major motion — a Trent Jr. inverted ball display for Giannis, aiming to both get the large fella downhill in opposition to a smaller guard on a swap or open a pitch again for a clear catch-and-shoot 3 — till there are 14 seconds left on the clock. That goes nowhere, so Giannis pivots right into a handoff to Dame, with GPII throughout him and Draymond in his lap on the hedge, Podziemski sliding as much as take Trent, Jimmy selecting up Giannis on the roll, and Buddy Hield zoning as much as play two on the weak facet, leaving Milwaukee with no higher choice within the dying seconds of the clock than a tightly contested Dame stepback within the nook.
Going oh-fer down the stretch in opposition to a protection that ranks seventh within the NBA this season and second since Butler’s debut doesn’t, in a vacuum, represent a disaster. However when it comes on the heels of similarstruggles throughout latest losses to the Magic, Cavaliers and Thunder — three different top-10 defenses, replete with size and physicality on the level of assault — it represents the continuation of a troubling sample for a Milwaukee facet that’s now 11-18 in opposition to groups with a .500 file or higher, 5-15 in opposition to groups with top-10 level differentials and simply 2-12 mixed in opposition to the Cavaliers, Celtics, Knicks, Thunder, Rockets and Nuggets — the highest three seeds in every convention.
This Bucks crew was anticipated to overwhelm opponents with offensive excellence after pairing Antetokounmpo and Lillard earlier than final season. Milwaukee now sits simply 14th in offensive effectivity and has scored 117.9 factors per 100 non-garbage-time possessions with Giannis and Dame sharing the ground, in keeping with Cleansing the Glass — a mark that might rank seventh within the NBA for the complete season. Good, however not nice — and, even with Antetokounmpo persevering with to supply at an MVP stage, actually not nice sufficient to constantly beat the form of opposition Milwaukee’s prone to face within the playoffs.
Opponents trying to defang the Bucks offense can cross-match wing defenders onto the floor-spacing Lopez, slot larger defenders onto Kuzma — who was guarded primarily by Quinten Submit and Chet Holmgren within the final two video games — and have them sag off to clog the paint, daring Milwaukee’s trade-deadline acquisition to knock down sufficient perimeter photographs to beat them. He’s 27-for-88 from 3-point vary (30.7%) and 38-for-120 on jumpers general (31.7%) for the reason that commerce deadline — a stage of ineffectiveness that may solely embolden opposing defenses to proceed cranking up the stress on Antetokounmpo, Lillard and Lopez when the video games matter most. And, at this stage, they all matter most.
Milwaukee’s West Coast highway journey continues Thursday with a matchup with the Lakers, who rank eleventh in defensive effectivity for the complete season and third since buying Luka Dončić, who will miss the Bucks recreation. The Bucks enter Thursday’s motion at 38-30, a recreation behind the Pacers for fourth place within the West, and in a digital tie for fifth with the surging Pistons, recent off a buzzer-beating game-winner by Cade Cunningham on Wednesday. If Rivers, Antetokounmpo and Lillard can’t discover solutions to drag the Bucks out of their offensive malaise, it might value them home-court benefit within the first spherical of the playoffs — and probably drop all of them the way in which all the way down to the sixth seed and a matchup with a Knicks crew that has blown Milwaukee out in each of their conferences this season.
“It’s everything,” Rivers stated after the Warriors loss. “We’re missing shots too, but we don’t have the right spacing. The ball’s not moving. We’re not attacking. We’re not getting to the paint. I got a whole list. But we gotta do it, and I gotta get them to do it. That’s my job.”
