The Milwaukee Bucks extended their road woes with a 144-118 loss in San Antonio on Friday night, falling to 1-3 on the trip and 26-20 overall. Hitting halftime up one, the Bucks fell behind early in the third and imploded later in the quarter, surrendering a 19-6 they never recovered from.
Doc Rivers was none too pleased with his team’s performance. “We were just awful all around,” he said. “Period. We gave up 17 points the first four minutes of the game. To me that set the tone.”
Giannis Antetokounmpo put up his usual team-leading numbers, 35 points, 14 rebounds and 6 assists, but it wasn’t nearly enough. And Rivers wasn’t done venting.
Doc Rivers Says Defense Doomed Milwaukee Bucks Vs San Antonio Spurs
The Bucks clearly struggled on defense. The Spurs’ 144 points were the most they have allowed all season.
“Listen, we gotta do a better job,” Doc asserted. “I gotta do a better job. All of us. We’ve been a great defensive team, [but] in the last three out of four nights on this trip, we have not been. So we got to look at the film and figure it out.”
In all three of their latest losses, Rivers’ group has given up over 125 points. Before the road trip, other than the Knicks on January 12, no opponent had reached that mark since the Bulls did in the second game of the season. Even after tonight, the Bucks remain 10th in defensive net rating.
But what’s been going on?
Positive shooting variance aided San Antonio in making 24 of 50 threes, but Milwaukee also left Spurs shooters wide open. “They made everything,” Rivers lamented. “Wemby hit a crazy shot (he did go back-court) but the other ones were off of dribble penetration. That’s how you give up threes….Our shell D broke down tonight, there’s no doubt about that.”
The Spurs also matched Milwaukee at the line, where they went 20-25. Victor Wembanyama had a much better day than his 10-point showing in the team’s first matchup this season. Going 7-7 himself on free throws, he finished with 30 points and 14 boards and added 6 blocks to his league-leading average (3.9 BPG coming in).
San Antonio moved the ball with ease on the Bucks defense, winning the assist column 37 to 24 and getting each starter into double digit scoring.
For Milwaukee, Damian Lillard scored 22 on 6-17 from the floor, along with 7 dimes, and maddening Khris Middleton added 21 off the bench on 8 of 9 shooting. In the starting lineup, Taurean Prince contributed 13 points on 14 shots to go with 5 rebounds.
Tired Team Missing Key Backup Big
Friday marked the fourth straight absence for Bobby Portis, who remained out due to personal reasons. Without him, the Bucks have only two real big men, Giannis and center Brook Lopez.
Coming off a quad strain, sniper AJ Green played his first game in two weeks but looked a bit rusty, ending the night 0-3 from the field.
Asked whether their absences have impacted the team, Rivers responded:
“It hurts, definitely. We went in the game thinking we had to get him rest, and we did in a lot of ways. What did he play, 24 minutes. But I thought he looked tired, I thought the whole team did. We’re asking too much out of him, we just are. And we know that, so we have to do something about it.”
Lopez finished with 6 points, 5 rebounds, and 1 block. Having to shoulder extra duties with Portis out, the 36-year-old may understandably be wearing down. On a positive note, the blowout allowed him to take him an early seat. Those 24 minutes were his only sub-30 game since the Bucks were obliterated by New York.
Milwaukee returns home for just a single game, Sunday against the Grizzlies, before playing three away games next week. They won’t enjoy that number of consecutive home contests until March 5-9. The All Star break, however, should help tired legs recuperate. The Bucks have 7 more games to make it there.
Hopefully they can beat Memphis on the weekend, but in any case, it would be hard to look worse than they did Friday night. Coach was so disgusted he compared their performance to an inebriated stupor.
“Honestly, it was so bad….It felt like a drunk game, is what I would call it, where you keep lying and making mistakes and you forget the thing you did the day before. That’s how the game felt.”
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