BANG FOR BUCKS
Milwaukee gets best of Nets again
Two plays best sum up the Nets’ 124-118 loss to the Bucks on Tuesday, and those plays sum up the Nets’ odds should they meet in a playoff series against Milwaukee down the line.
Back-to-back missed shots from Kevin Durant, and an offensive rebound by Milwaukee’s Donte DiVincenzo encapsulated what could be a nightmare matchup in the postseason.
Durant followed a 42-point performance against the Bucks on Sunday with a 32-point outing on Tuesday. But it could have been 35 had he made either of the looks he got in a single possession with a minute to go in the fourth quarter: a transition three from the right wing, and a shot from the same spot two seconds later.
He missed both, forfeiting a chance to make it a two-point game in the waning moments and ultimately giving the Bucks room to keep the Nets at bay.
“I should’ve drove.
I shouldn’t have shot the threes,” Durant conceded. “I was kicking myself right after I shot
’em because I’d just got to the rim before that, so I should’ve drove.
He then added: “But I felt good shooting the ball, too, so, s--t. I was just trying it there. But hindsight is always 20-20, so I wish I’d have drove it now.”
The Nets got one more shot down the stretch after Giannis Antetokounmpo, who scored 36 points, missed on a deep three with 20 seconds to go. DiVincenzo, however, beat the Nets to the spot, tapping out an offensive rebound that embodied a night full of Bucks hustle plays, and a Nets’ lack thereof.
Milwaukee finished with a whopping 15 offensive rebounds: DiVincenzo pulled down six of them, including the game-sealing tip, plus two each from Antetokounmpo, Jrue Holiday, Brook Lopez and P.J. Tucker.
“I’m definitely disappointed we were outworked,” said Blake Griffin,
who defended Antetokounmpo often down the stretch. “They were more physical than us on both ends of the floor. That can’t happen. We have to match the intensity. That’s a thing you can control. That’s on us,” “I mean Donte DeVincenzo had six offensive rebounds. That can’t happen. So we have to want it more and we have to be the more physical team on both ends of the floor.”
Round Two of the Eastern Conference’s heavyweight bout between the Nets and Bucks did not disappoint. The two championship hopefuls traded blow after blow, run after run, with the Bucks emerging victorious again because of their execution on the defensive end.
It was a chess match, with the Nets keeping the same game plan of letting Antetokounmpo shoot threes. After hitting four-of-eight on Sunday, he hit another four on 12 attempts.
“We made a few mistakes, but overall, you’re gonna live with a lot of the shots he took,” coach Steve Nash said.
Antetokounmpo’s night wasn’t the reason the Nets lost. Neither was Kyrie Irving, who bounced back from a poor performance by his standards on Sunday to score a game-high 38 points on 14-of-25 shooting from the field.
The Nets shot 49% from the field and 46.5% from three, but couldn’t get stops down the stretch.
The Bucks pulled away with an 18-3 run late in the fourth quarter, during which Nash did not call a timeout. He said postgame that by the time he internally debated whether or not to call one, “it wasn’t going to make a difference.”
“Tonight, maybe I could have called another timeout, but you also want to make sure you save a few for the end of the game,” said Nash, who has historically opted not to call timeouts so his players can solve their way through opposing runs on the fly. “So yeah I was caught in a little dilemma, but you know, maybe I should have.”
The Nets did not have James Harden, who continues to miss games with a right hamstring strain. It’s become apparent they’ll need him if they hope to realize the championship goals they have for this season.