The Milwaukee Bucks are no longer the owner of the longest winning streak in the NBA. While riding a seven-game winning streak on Wednesday, Milwaukee fell 119-104 to the Atlanta Hawks, the new proprietor of the league’s best winning streak (tied with Dallas). The Bucks came out strong, leading by as much as ten points in the first quarter before the Hawks took the lead, which they did not surrender for the rest of the game.
The Milwaukee Bucks lost all four quarters, scoring their lowest total since a mid-November win against the Houston Rockets. Per one data-driven basketball site that uses AI and computer vision to evaluate the quality of a player’s shot, Milwaukee received an off-night from their superstar, Giannis Antetokounmpo.
ShotQuality Dings Milwaukee Bucks For Offensive Woes
According to ShotQuality:
We use computer vision and AI to deliver player location data, which drives basketball’s most predictive shot models.
On Wednesday, Milwaukee scored just 104 points on a ShotQuality-expected 118 points. After both having higher-than-expected outcomes in the team’s Tuesday win against the Detroit Pistons, AJ Green and Giannis Antetokounmpo scored well below expectations on Wednesday. Despite dropping 31 points, SQ expected Antetokounmpo to score 37 points based on the 90+ variables used to examine the quality of a player’s shot. Meanwhile, Green should have scored well into double-digits based on shots taken, a far cry from his six points on 2-of-11 shooting. As for Antetokounmpo, he hit just 58% of his free throws and shot 57% from the field, well off his 61% mark for the season.
Unfortunately for the Milwaukee Bucks, it was not tough luck that led to the home loss against the Atlanta Hawks. Despite scoring 119 points, SQ expected more than 130 points of offensive output from Atlanta. Superstar guard Trae Young scored 17 points on an SQ-expected 25 points.
Bucks Regroup for Friday Tilt Against Boston
The Milwaukee Bucks will enjoy a day off before hitting the road for a two-city trip. They will visit the Boston Celtics on Friday, with Khris Middleton making his long-awaited season debut. Middleton has missed the first 21 games of the season while recovering from offseason arthroscopic ankle surgery.
Middleton played in 55 games last season, scoring 15.1 points per game on 49% from the field. The 32-year-old is two years removed from his third All-Star season in which he scored 20.1 points per game.
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