Bucks’ “team basketball” has gotten them to the NBA Cup semifinals for the second straight year

MILWAUKEE – For the second straight year, the Milwaukee Bucks will travel to Las Vegas for an NBA Cup semifinal game.

With 37 points and seven rebounds from Giannis Antetokounmpo and 28 points and nine assists from Damian Lillard, the Bucks secured a hard-fought 114-109 victory over the Orlando Magic on Tuesday, punching their ticket to the trip. On Saturday, the Bucks will face the winner of Wednesday night’s game between the New York Knicks and the Atlanta Hawks.

While the Bucks reached the semifinals in the NBA Cup’s first two seasons, the path to get to this point couldn’t have been more different.

Last season, the Bucks went 14-6 heading to Las Vegas under head coach Adrian Griffin. They had lost a few games but were victorious at the start of the season and picked up a lot of points. They had started the season incredibly well with their first head coach, even if there were problems brewing beneath the surface.

This season, the Bucks have already taken a completely different path than Vegas at 13-11. They went 2-8 in their first 10 games, and those early struggles forced them to listen to outside sources weighing in on their prospects for the season, their dwindling chances of competing for a championship this season, and the possibility of one Breaking apart what was, wonders should be a championship core.

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“We kept fighting — and that’s a hard thing to do when you’re struggling and you’re expected to win and people are talking about your team,” Lillard said. “It takes a connected group to get back on our feet, get out of this situation and… get to where we got to. We just need to understand this and not get to where we are and think our job is done. You know, we’re back where we want to be, in a good position, and we have to continue to build on that.”

While advancing to Las Vegas just means the Bucks won five specific games to start the season, Lillard explained why getting to the NBA Cup semifinals means even more to this team this season.

“I just think it’s more than just coming to Vegas,” Lillard said. “I think it’s up to us to be able to get ourselves out of a hole. Being in the NBA, I know you can’t do it with one or two or three or four people, you know? It takes the right kind of energy to spread through the group. How we get to the practice facility, what the energy is like in the locker room, how we interact with our coaches in practice and how we’re able to just stay connected even when things aren’t going well and the coaches might be You might become frustrated that we’re not doing things well enough.

“We might be frustrated with ourselves. And we just stayed connected.”

This bond and togetherness were clearly evident in Tuesday’s victory.

While the outside world may have thought it would be easy because the Magic were missing Paolo Banchero, Franz Wagner and Jonathan Isaac, the Bucks were adamant their opponents would make things difficult for them on Tuesday. Rivers made that clear in his pregame remarks as he praised the Magic’s third-ranked defense and the culture coach Jamahl Mosley instilled in his team to find the ability to be competitive no matter who is on the field in particular on defense.

The Magic went early against the Bucks and held a 33-25 lead after one quarter, largely because they forced seven turnovers in the first quarter and made every shot the Bucks fired uncomfortable. Milwaukee flipped the script in the second quarter thanks to a great performance from Bobby Portis, who scored 12 of his 22 points in the period. While the rest of the team struggled to find a rhythm, Portis knocked down his first seven shots and got the Bucks back into the game.

“He’s just playing great,” Rivers said of Portis. “His emotions are in the right place. His focus is right. You can see his energy. The last two games were fantastic. Without Bobby we would be in trouble.”

Thanks to significant contributions from Portis in the second quarter, the Bucks managed to take a one-point lead at halftime. However, the Magic refused to back down after the Bucks took the lead. They continued to fight in the third quarter and the score remained close.

Then Khris Middleton had his moment.

The Bucks stayed close early in the second half thanks to Antetokounmpo’s sheer willpower, taking a 71-70 lead with 3:32 left in the third quarter. Then, in a seven-possession sequence that lasted just over 90 seconds, Middleton grabbed two steals and dished out three assists to help the Bucks jump to a 10-point lead, their largest lead of the night.

This was only Middleton’s third game back after missing the first 21 games of the season due to off-season procedures on both ankles. As he continued to try to find his scoring rhythm, Middleton didn’t score in his 20 minutes of playing time, but did grab four rebounds, make three steals and dish out eight assists.

“Presence,” Lillard said of Middleton’s importance to the win. “Khris just knows. He understands the game. He understands matchups. He understands what is supposed to happen. He always follows what’s happening in the game.”

Despite Portis’ scoring effort in the second quarter and Middleton’s follow-up play in the third quarter, the Magic refused to give up. They fought back and took a one-point lead with 2:12 left. As the game progressed, the Bucks did what they had done so often last year and leaned on Lillard, who scored 15 of his 28 points in the fourth quarter, including nine in the final minute.

Checkers time. ⌚️ pic.twitter.com/8mkNhuXlFP

— Milwaukee Bucks (@Bucks) December 11, 2024

Lillard performed well, as he has often in his storied career, but after the game Antetokounmpo wanted to draw attention to the smaller details of Lillard’s step-back 3 to tie the game with 52.2 seconds left. While Lillard’s individual brilliance helped him make that shot, four other players helped create the situation in which Lillard could thrive offensively.

“This is a team game,” Antetokounmpo said. “It’s 100 percent a team game.”

Sitting at the podium after the game, Antetokounmpo told reporters everything that led to Lillard getting the chance to work in isolation against Wendell Carter Jr. on the left wing.

He explained how he brought the ball up and then Middleton cut into open space as Portis was blocked by his defender. Antetokounmpo talked about how Middleton got the defense’s attention by trying to get into action with Portis before throwing her back to him, and how he was ready to attack on the screen Lillard had set for him, to force the Magic to change.

“Now Dame has one, two, three seconds to operate, then Dame will be at her best,” Antetokounmpo explained. “He can do pump fakes. He can go left. He can make him slim. So we all worked together to get him in the position where he could operate and get that shot.

“And it feels good when you do something like that because you’re like, ‘Damn, this is working.’ “Team basketball works. We can still do what we do by playing together and moving the ball.”

While the Bucks were buoyed by the individual brilliance of Antetokounmpo and Lillard earlier this season, these moments of synergy and teamwork have helped bring the team back from the brink. The Bucks are far from the contender they wanted to be at the start of the season, but they are pulling together to achieve their goals and are slowly getting closer to where they want to be at the end of the season.

After Tuesday’s win, Rivers reminded his team that while they have made great strides since the start of the season, they still have a long way to go to achieve their goals. Even goals like winning the 2024 NBA Cup.

“That’s what we wanted to do,” Rivers said of the Bucks coming to Las Vegas. “And you set a goal and try to achieve it, right? Our goal isn’t just to get to Vegas; We want to win this thing.

“So we still have two games left but it’s good to get there. You have to get there first, and we did that.”

(Photo by Damian Lillard: Jesse D. Garrabrant / NBAE via Getty Images)