ZingVlog

MILWAUKEE — With a little more than four minutes remaining and a two-point lead in the fourth quarter of Monday’s contest against the Chicago Bulls, Milwaukee Bucks guard Damian Lillard prepared to inbound the ball on the left side underneath the Bucks’ basket.

When Lillard received the ball from the official, he lobbed it to the free throw line, where Khris Middleton retrieved it after fighting for position on the right block. From there, Lillard sprinted off a double screen from Giannis Antetokounmpo and Brook Lopez on the left baseline. As Lillard was breaking free, Middleton whipped a pass to the left corner with his left hand.

Advertisement

The ball struck Lopez in the right shoulder as he re-positioned himself to set a better screen for Lillard and rolled out near the half-court line. Middleton ran the ball down before it went out of bounds, entered into a pick-and-roll with Antetokounmpo and found Lopez in the left corner, who beat a closeout and found Antetokounmpo for a lob on a drive.

The play perfectly epitomized the Bucks’ disjointed effort against the Bulls on Monday. It wasn’t pretty, but the Bucks eventually pulled out a 133-129 overtime victory against their Central Division rival, who had won four straight games playing without injured star Zach LaVine.

“Last time we played Chicago, it was a different outcome,” Bucks head coach Adrian Griffin said. “But I thought we continued to fight, continued to execute down the stretch. These wins, they don’t ask how you got it, but it’s how many you’re going to get at the end of the year, that’s the most important thing. It’s a W. I walked in the locker room and I said, ‘It’s 129 Bulls, 133 Bucks, that’s all that matters right now.'”

Antetokounmpo led the way for the Bucks with 32 points, 12 rebounds and six assists in a 41-minute effort, but it was an unusual game for him. Through three quarters, Antetokounmpo had taken just five shots because the Bulls were regularly sending double teams in his direction. In the first half, the Bucks used that to their advantage on their way to a 74-65 lead after two quarters.

“They were double-teaming and guys were open,” Antetokounmpo said. “In the pick-and-roll, they were showing hard, guys were slipping (screens), they were open again. When I got the ball in the pocket, they were coming and swarming me. Brook was open. Guys in the corner were open. I was just trying to make the right play.

“There’s going to be games and there’s going to be teams around the league that I’m going to draw so much attention, which sometimes me taking a shot over two guys is not the best shot. Me trying to play in the crowd is not the best shot. I think I’ve gotten to the point that I’ve accepted that.”

Advertisement

While Antetokounmpo tallied all six of his assists for the game in the first half, sometimes he wasn’t even the one getting credit in the box score for making the right play.

For example, on the play below, Lillard ended up getting the assist to Bobby Portis (17 points, seven rebounds), but it was the attention Antetokounmpo drew with the double team and Antetokounmpo’s subsequent unselfish play that bent the Bulls’ defense out of position.

Lillard is a massive threat behind the 3-point line, so Bulls guard Jevon Carter rotated to Lillard, which forced the Bulls into defensive rotations and ultimately helped Portis get free underneath the basket.

Other times though, Antetokounmpo got the credit in the box score and in the highlight reel, like he did on this beautiful no-look pass to Lopez.

Last week, Antetokounmpo and Lillard spoke to The Athletic about their burgeoning pick-and-roll connection. Two things that they brought up were evident in the play above.

First, Antetokounmpo discussed the need to set pick-and-rolls higher on the floor to give him more space to serve as a playmaker in the short roll when teams force the ball out of Lillard’s hands. They did that on this play with Antetokounmpo catching the ball closer to the 3-point line than the free-throw line. Then, Lillard talked about the need for Antetokounmpo to make teams pay for giving him all the attention on the roll ,and Antetokounmpo absolutely did that with a beautiful no-look pass to Lopez (19 points) in the dunker spot.

But after a first half of taking care of the ball and beating the Bulls with the pass though, the Bucks scored just 17 points in the third quarter and allowed the Bulls back into the game. The Bucks committed five turnovers in the third and didn’t bring the energy they needed to close out the Bulls out of halftime.

Advertisement

“I thought we were kind of flat,” Griffin said of his team’s effort in the third quarter. “And I thought we just stopped executing. We went more one-on-one, kind of rushed offense. When we execute, we get in our right spots and our spacing is correct, good things happen. But, again, when you play a team like that, you know, defensively they’re going to get into us, they’re gonna send multiple bodies, we gotta continue to execute, find the open man, make the right play.”

The Bucks’ sluggish third quarter led into a fourth quarter in which the Bucks did enough to put themselves in a position to win, but couldn’t close out the game.

After taking just five shots in the first three quarters, Antetokounmpo turned up his aggression as he figured out his running mate didn’t have his own scoring going. Lillard tallied 14 points in 41 minutes against the Bulls on Monday and made only three of his 17 shots. It was only the eighth time in Lillard’s career he had attempted 15 or more shots in a game and made three or fewer of those attempts, per Basketball-Reference’s Stathead tool.

Giannis taking over. pic.twitter.com/w6o4y3HXz7

— Milwaukee Bucks (@Bucks) December 12, 2023

Antetokounmpo scored 15 fourth-quarter points on 6-of-7 shooting, but the Bucks kept the Bulls in the game with a few late game blunders. With a chance to go up six with 1:34 remaining, Antetokounmpo made just one of two from the free-throw line. With a chance to go up five with 36.9 seconds left, Lopez was whistled for an illegal screen on an Antetokounmpo drive that led to a dunk. With a chance to go up three with 12 seconds left, Lillard went just one-of-two at the free-throw line.

All of which led to DeMar DeRozan (41 points, 11 assists) sending the game to overtime with a floater over the top of Middleton with 3.7 seconds remaining.

DEEBO SENDS US TO OT.@NBCSChicago | @DeMar_DeRozan pic.twitter.com/OzxPXKGqvw

— Chicago Bulls (@chicagobulls) December 12, 2023

The Bucks struggled mightily to put together a consistent effort on both ends of the floor in the second half, but seemed to regain their composure in overtime.

On the offensive end, the Bucks were decisive, picking out the right plays and executing when it mattered most. Repeatedly, the Bucks decided to go to a pick-and-roll look with Antetokounmpo and Lopez, which forced Bulls center Nikola Vučević to attempt to cover Antetokounmpo in space.

By putting Vučević in uncomfortable positions, Antetokounmpo tallied four of his five overtime points on those pick-and-rolls. They also created situations in which the Bulls had to foul Lopez at the rim to keep him from scoring an easy two as the roll man.

Advertisement

On the defensive end, the Bucks finally found something that worked in overtime, even if it required a little help from the Bulls.

To end the fourth quarter, DeRozan relentlessly attacked Middleton off the dribble trying to get all the way to the rim. When DeRozan didn’t do that, the Bulls sent whoever Lillard was guarding to screen for DeRozan to get Lillard on DeRozan with a switch. In overtime, DeRozan and the Bulls were a bit less deliberate.

Just over a minute into overtime, the Bulls allowed Antetokounmpo to be the player switched onto DeRozan for an isolation possession.

DeRozan realized at the last moment that Antetokounmpo was going to block his shot and dished it to Vučević late, but the Bulls’ big man did not have nearly enough time to attempt to make a move on Middleton and instead tried a high-arcing fadeaway jumper.

Ninety seconds later, DeRozan settled for a jumper against Middleton.

“It was just great to see our resolve.” Lopez said of the Bulls going 0-of-9 from the field to start overtime. “I thought whoever was put in the action did a great job of stepping up and taking the challenge. Whoever was out there on the floor. Giannis at one time. Khris. Dame. Our guys were stepping it up and accepting that challenge.”

The Bulls cut the Bucks’ lead down to just two points by fouling the Bucks to lengthen the game, but the Bucks did a better job hitting free throws in overtime and sealed a win. It has become a bit of an alarming trend this season, but Monday ended up being another night in which the Bucks did not play as well as they wanted, but still snuck out a win.

(Photo of Giannis Antetokounmpo: Stacy Revere / Getty Images)

ncG1vNJzZmismJqutbTLnquim16YvK57lGpqaW5ka3xzfJFsZmpqX2Z%2FcLPImqWnoaNirq%2FAxK2mpKelo7qxu4ybrJyjo2KvtrjLrGY%3D