Stakes are high as Bucks, Raptors meet in Game 6
There’s no escaping the reality of what’s at stake when the Toronto Raptors host the Milwaukee Bucks in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference finals tonight.
The surging Raptors have won three straight, putting them on the brink of the first NBA Finals berth in team history.
The Bucks, who finished as the NBA’s top team in the regular season and once led this series 2-0, have no more room for error after their first three-game losing streak all season.
These two teams have spent months trying to stay even-keeled, treating everything as just another game. That’s starting to get a lot tougher.
“It’s an elimination game,” Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer said Friday. “It’s just a fact.”
Raptors coach Nick Nurse added to that, suggesting the outcome of the series could have franchise altering implications.
“These are games that now have significance as far as one team’s going one direction, and one going the other, possibly,” Nurse said.
MVP candidate Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Bucks need a win to prolong their hopes of reaching the finals for the first time since 1974.
REPORT: BLAZERS, TEAM
PRESIDENT OLSHEY AGREE
TO CONTRACT EXTENSION >> The Portland Trail Blazers and president of basketball operations Neil Olshey agreed to a contract extension that will keep him with the team through the end of the 2023-24 season, according to published reports.
Olshey, 54, joined the team as general manager in June 2012 and was promoted in 2015. The Trail Blazers have made the playoffs six consecutive seasons and advanced to the Western Conference finals this season for the first time since 2000.
Olshey’s first task will be to secure the Portland futures of guards Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum, both of whom he selected in the draft.
Coach Terry Stotts also signed a multiyear contract extension earlier this week.
NBA FREE AGENCY PERIOD TO START SIX HOURS EARLIER
>> The NBA free agency period will open six hours earlier this year, the league and the National Basketball Players Association announced.
Teams and free agents now will be able to open their negotiations on June 30 at 3 p.m. PT. Country Club’s East Course in Pittsford, New York.
First-round leader Scott Parel and Retief Goosen were two strokes back.
LAW, SONG, CONCOLINO SHARE LPGA TOUR LEAD AT KINGSMILL
>> Playing partners Jennifer Song and Jacqui Concolino stuck together in the Pure Silk Championship. Bronte Law kept up, too. Rebounding from a bogey on the par-4 14th with three straight birdies, Law shot a 3-under 68 at Kingsmill Resort in Williamsburg, Virginia, to match early starters Song and Concolino at 9-under 133. Song, tied for the firstround lead with Law and Anna Nordqvist, also had a 68.
Carlota Ciganda and Madelene Sagstrom were a stroke back.
WIE WITHDRAWS FROM U.S. WOMEN’S OPEN >> Michelle Wie withdrew from next week’s U.S. Women’s Open Championship because of her lingering hand injury.
The U.S. Women’s Open will be played next Thursday through Sunday at the
Country Club of Charleston in South Carolina.
Wie has five career wins, including the 2014 U.S Women’s Open. Wie, 29, has not played in a tournament since April in the LOTTE Championship, where she missed the cut.