Bragging rights on the line
3 players focus on UNC-Syracuse game
With Friday night’s 113-110 victory over the Orlando Magic in hand, the Milwaukee Bucks can shift their focus to the next game as the close of the regular season draws near.
For three players, though, the next big game they’re eyeing is Saturday night at NRG Stadium in Houston. That’s where Syracuse and North Carolina will meet in the Final Four after a game between Villanova and Oklahoma. With guards Michael CarterWilliams and Tyler Ennis playing their college ball for the Orange and center John Henson a proud Tar Heel, the barbs have flown across the locker room since the matchup was set this past weekend. “They’re scared, they’re scared to talk,” Henson said of his Syracuse teammates.
Henson, who played three years at UNC, is rarely at a loss for words. North Carolina was ranked No. 1 in the preseason and has taken a fairly straightforward path to the national semifinals, entering the weekend as the favorite to win it all. Syracuse, on the other hand, is the first No. 10 seed to make it to a Final Four, going on a tear after many thought the Orange didn’t deserve to make the tournament at all.
“John’s been talking all year,” Ennis said. “I think it’s going to be a real good game. As long as we can score the ball I think we’ll be in a tight game, but they’re a really good team.”
Ennis doesn’t know where he’s going to watch the game yet or whether he’ll tune in alongside Carter-Williams, whom he replaced as Syracuse’s point guard after Carter-Williams left for the NBA following his sophomore year.
“We might all watch; I don’t know if I want to hear John talk the whole game,” Ennis said. “If ’Cuse wins I’ll definitely have some bragging rights for the year.”
Embracing contact: For Jabari Parker, aggressively attacking the rim is nothing new. On Friday night, he did that early and often, slamming down multiple highlight-reel dunks regardless of who was in his way.
For most of the season, though, finding a way to get fouled on his trips to the lane has been a different story. Parker’s averaging 2.9 freethrow attempts per game, a minuscule number for a player that does as much damage as he does in the paint.
That was the case again Friday as he hit his average with three tries from the charity stripe. In Wednesday’s win over the Phoenix Suns, though, he was at the other end of the spectrum, tying his season high with 11 free-throw attempts, making nine.
“Accepting the contact, being able to accept the contact and attempting to finish,” coach Jason Kidd said regarding what Parker did differently Wednesday. “Sometimes he can get away from the contact, so any time he accepts the contact it can be a foul and most likely in this league it will be a foul.”
Kidd noted that Parker is
still learning how to accept contact, something he probably didn’t have to figure out before getting into the NBA.
“In college he was a dominant player, he didn’t need to deal with contact,” Kidd said. “In high school being a dominant player he didn’t need the contact. . . . It’s just understanding how to use your body to create the contact and get to the free-throw line and those points count.”
Vaughn in the starting lineup: Bucks rookie guard Rashad Vaughn, who is three games removed from a stint in the NBA Development League, got the first start of his career.
Kidd made the change because Jerryd Bayless mildly hyperextended his right knee Wednesday and missed Friday’s game. Kidd could have gone with Ennis, who has played better as of late, but opted for Vaughn so Ennis could continue leading the second unit.
“That group is playing well,” Kidd said pregame. “We have the opportunity to look at a different person starting, see how Vaughn will react to that. We thought his minutes in the last game were a positive, so we want to see if he can build on that.”
Vaughn played 221⁄ minutes,
2 recording four points, three rebounds and a steal, though he went just 2 for 6 from the field, including 0 for 2 from three-point range.
“I thought again, positive,” Kidd said of Vaughn’s output. “He was aggressive. Being a rookie, it’s not always about scoring a lot of points. His energy on the ball and being able to guard point guards in this league is something he’s learning how to do.”