POST GAME MIL BUCKS - AWAY

Celtics Wrap: Bucks Snap Boston’s Win Streak With 106-102 Victory

NESN by Adam London on Tue, Apr 3, 2018 at 10:27PM

The Boston Celtics will have to try and start a new win streak as the NBA playoffs near. The Celtics had their win streak snapped Tuesday night in Milwaukee, as the Bucks outlasted Boston for a 106-102 win at BMO Harris Bradley Center. As he’s been for most teams all season, Giannis Antetokounmpo simply was too much of a problem for the C’s. The Greek Freak notched a game-high 29 points to go along with 11 rebounds and six assists to help the Bucks pick up a home win. Jaylen Brown carried the offensive load for Boston with a team-high 24 points and was one of five Celtics players to score in double figures. Boston made things interesting down the stretch, but Milwaukee didn’t allow for any late-game heroics from its opponent this time around. With the loss, the Celtics drop to 53-24, while the Bucks improve to 42-36. Here’s how it all went down:

STARTING FIVE PG: Kadeem Allen SG: Jaylen Brown SF: Jayson Tatum PF: Al Horford C: Aron Baynes

POINT GUARD INJURIES Terry Rozier was out of action for the Celtics on Tuesday, missing his first game of the season with an ankle injury. Shane Larkin also missed the matchup against the Bucks with illness.

EFFICIENCY The Celtics held a 31-26 lead after one quarter of play, but both teams had a high level of success from the floor early on in the contest. In fact, the Bucks (68.6 percent) held the advantage in shooting percentage over the Celtics (57.9 percent) in the opening frame. Brown and Tatum paced the C’s with eight points apiece, while Khris Middleton notched a game-high 10 first-quarter points after knocking down all four of his shots. Boston also was careful with the basketball early on, committing one turnover to Milwaukee’s five. BENCH BOOST Boston’s starters collectively were quiet in the second quarter, but luckily for the C’s, their reserves stepped up to help the team take a 58-56 lead into the break. After being limited to two points apiece in the first, Marcus Morris and Greg Monroe responded with much louder second frames scoring eight and six points, respectively. The duo combined to score more than half of Boston’s second-quarter points.

THIRD-QUARTER TROUBLES Boston led for the majority of the first half, but a sluggish third quarter plagued the C’s against the surging Bucks. Boston only managed to score 15 points in the frame, allowing Milwaukee to take a 79-71 lead into the fourth. It was a particularly troubling showing on offense for the Celtics, as they only converted on six of their 23 third-quarter shots.

DOWN TO THE WIRE Despite Antetokounmpo taking over the fourth with 10 points, the Celtics stayed well within striking distance throughout the quarter. Boston cut the lead to four on a Horford three-pointer with just over two minutes remaining and got as close as three with 22 seconds left via a Tatum dunk. Tatum had a chance to bring Boston within two on the ensuing possession, but the rookie forward stepped out of bounds before hoisting a 3-point shot, paving the way for the Bucks to ice the game.

PLAY OF THE GAME Tatum made this buzzer-beating shot look easy.

UP NEXT The Celtics play their second game of a back-to-back Wednesday night in Toronto against the Raptors. Tip-off from Air Canada Centre is set for 8 p.m. ET.

When you're starting your #5 point guard and he's a two-way player you're supposed to lose, big, especially if the other team's starting point guard is Eric Bledsoe.  Well, Kadeem Allen didn't do anything great, but he didn't screw up either and that's a victory for the 25 year old.  Our 3rd quarter, in which we only shot 26% and scored only 15 points, is what killed us.

Even so, we had a chance to win and, in fact, only lost by 4.   We got hurt, towards the end, with a couple of weird calls.  One was a double lane violation by Baynes and Henson with 5:37 left and the score 92-89 Bucks on a Jaylen Brown frito attempt.  Rather than letting Jaylen take the frito again the refs went for a jump ball at mid-court between Baynes and The FREAK?!  Why was the freak doing the jump when Henson was the one who committed the lane violation?  Middleton got the jump ball and Giannis got a dunk out of it to increase their lead to 94-89.  Then, with 53.4 seconds left, the Freak blocked a Brown layup that was whistled as a goal tend, and then reversed and Milwaukee was given the ball on the rebound.  But the whistle had already been blown for the goal tend.  Once the whistle blows, it's dead and nothing after that counts.  I think it should have been Celtics ball side out.  The score was 101-96 before that and 103-96 after they scored the ball.  That's a big difference.  It's the difference between 5 points, that's 2 possessions with under a minute left, and 7 points and 3 possessions.  One is doable, the other...?

Tom Westerholm @Tom_NBA
yesterday
Jaylen Brown on Kadeem Allen: “Kadeem's a dog, man, since his Pac-12 days at Arizona. I couldn’t stand going against Kadeem, just because his ball pressure is nasty."

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Bucks fans feeling their oats.  Their chant, at the end of the game was "Bucks in six!  Bucks in six!".  I don't think we're their 1st round opponent right now, but they might be by the end, but "Bucks in 6?".  They hung on to win by 4 despite awful shooting nights from Tatum and Morris and we were without Rozier and Larkin (much less Kyrie and Smart and Theis).  Rozier and Larkin aren't worth 5 points?  Yep, they sure are.

Abby Chin
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#Bucks fan just yelled, “Boston cream donuts are the worst!” Before I could correct him, he yelled back, “just kidding, they’re pretty good!” #truth

5:56 PM - 3 Apr 2018


You can't stop The Freak.  Only he can stop himself, and he gave us some help by taking 3 3pt fgas that he is just terrible at.  Otherwise, he is positively other-worldly.  When, not if, he adds an outside shooting game he will be completely unstoppable, like LeBron was when he was young and then added that to his game.  If you could keep young LeBron on the outside taking jumpshots you had a chance, but if he put the ball on the floor and got a shoulder even even with yours you were doomed.  That's where Giannis is now.  Wait a few years.  Moose Monroe played with him in Milwaukee.  He said Giannis' work ethic is unreal, he is ALWAYS in the gym, he only knows hard work.  Wait a few years and he will be a joy to watch and a terror to play against, even more so than he is already.

Middleton kept them in the game until Giannis caught fire and Bledsoe scored later.  We did not play good defense on Middleton for the first quarter.  He had 10 of his 20 in that first quarter on 4-4.  He was 7-13 on the game, so that's 3-9 the rest of the game, so his 1st quarter was where he did the damage.

We were worried about our guards but our forwards struggled.  Tatum 5-13 and Morris 4-16 for a combined 9-29 from that position.  5 rebounds, combined.  Morris had 5 turnovers.  Clearly, the worst game by Mook in quite a while.  Get it out of your system now, big guy, we can't afford many more of these moving forward.




Jaylen had to open some eyes in Milwaukee.  He was overpowering on offense.  Bucks head coach Joe Prunty had problems with match ups there.  There were a few sequences where 97 year old Jason Terry had to guard Jaylen.  Like taking candy from a baby except with less crying.

A wasted opportunity, Cleveland did us a favor beating Toronto.  

http://www.espn.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=400975908









bob


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Have you ever seen a team without a real point guard? Four guys out of action at one position.

Even so, as bob mentioned, the Cs had some chances to win this game. Great effort by a very undermanned team, in my opinion. Did get out rebounded by 4 so that was part of a close game loss.

Getting the injured brigade back in uniform is key to a chance of winning in the playoffs.

Last night's game reminded me of two weeks ago when I went to LA Fitness for my workout.  I lift every other day.  As my strength increases I am bound to add more weight and then I hit a point where the weight is too heavy to lift.  The Celtics are not going to win too many games without a PG.  

The Celtics have been adding weight all year but finally hit a challenge where the weight was too heavy to lift.  We miss our 4 PG's

bob


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