101-89 Bucks win on the road and lead this series 1-0!
Giannis 9 for 25 from the floor. 6 for 11 from the line. 5 turnovers. No Middleton. No Buck shot better than 50 from the floor. Celtics had 18 threes, the Bucks had 12.
I'd have thought all that meant a 20 point loss, but the Bucks defense was elite today. The Celtics were 10 for 34 inside the arc with 18 turnovers.
Celtics jacked up 50(!) 3 pointers. I can live with that.
@Blair Kiel posted:I only glance at game posts, but you really struggle to enjoy games, don’t you?
No. No one watching the game would argue that those weren't dumb fouls. Chasing Al Horford at the half court line, trying to jump over the entire FT lineup after a FT miss, and another foul on Tatum 30 feet form the basket trying for a steal. Those happened in about a 4 minute period.
Giannis settled down after that and played incredibly smart basketball. 3 years ago that type of game from Giannis is a loss, but he's evolved to be able to dominate games even when he's struggling to generate his own offense.
Jevon Carter having to play in place of George Hill is the biggest blessing in disguise one can imagine. He was +25 in 21 minutes.
It's interesting that Ibaka isn't getting minutes. Is he just washed up, or did they trade for him specifically for an Embiid matchup?
Celtics clearly were not ready for the Bucks physicality. You had to know Milwaukee was sick and tired of hearing how good Boston was and how they “dodged” the Nets. Well, the Bucks dominated them in their house and Giannis and Lopez didn’t do much offensively. Boston made 18 long range shots, yet still got blown out.
The announcers were talking about how atypical Jalen Brown was today. Well, Matthews and Carter and Holiday at times had their way with him. By the way, someone needs to tell me why Brooklyn kicked Carter to the curb? He’s been fantastic on D. If George Hill returns that’s another good defender the Bucks can throw at Brown or Smart.
@Tschmack posted:Celtics clearly were not ready for the Bucks physicality. You had to know Milwaukee was sick and tired of hearing how good Boston was and how they “dodged” the Nets. Well, the Bucks dominated them in their house and Giannis and Lopez didn’t do much offensively. Boston made 18 long range shots, yet still got blown out.
The announcers were talking about how atypical Jalen Brown was today. Well, Matthews and Carter and Holiday at times had their way with him. By the way, someone needs to tell me why Brooklyn kicked Carter to the curb? He’s been fantastic on D. If George Hill returns that’s another good defender the Bucks can throw at Brown or Smart.
Jevon Carter is basically Eric Bledsoe on defense, but without the playoff offensive problems.
@WolfPack posted:Did Giannis mean to bounce it to himself off the backboard? that was siiiiick
Definitely. A two-fer. Assist and a score.
That was pretty awesome seeing Brad leaving his seat with like 6 minutes left in the game. He wasn't wrong but that's an early exit for a playoff game at home.
Credit to Bud for scouting this team and matching things up well in game 1.
Case in point - Robert Williams is a good young defensive player but he’s no threat offensively. If the Celtics want to play him a lot of minutes it means they can double Tatum or Brown and that’s a mismatch for Milwaukee.
Horford played almost 40 minutes because he’s a threat offensively but he will not survive this series playing that much.
Tatum is an elite scoring big but the Bucks made him work for every shot. Same thing with Brown.
This is why the Bucks are so damn good. Most of their guys are legitimate two way players. They can get a rebound or defend or knock down a basket. Boston has some good players but they need more from their bench and if the Celtics aren’t knocking down 3s they are cooked.
Milwaukee needs to make a point and bury these fuckers. Win game 2 and then sweep their asses. Boston looked completely overwhelmed today. Kick their asses again in Beantown and finish them off in Milwaukee.
The Bucks are incredibly good because they play hard and for the most part, smart and unselfish. Giannis is a talant but when he has an off day offensively, well, look how the team played D today. The Celtics looked defeated by the start of the fourth and Milwaukee just had to stay composed to close it out.
From a yahoo story:
''Offensively, not our best night. I thought we guarded well enough,'' Celtics coach Ime Udoka said. ''To lose a 12-point game when we shot so poorly bodes well for us. In a way it's good to get this dud out of the way, offensively.''
nothing to do with our D
Udoka is a fucking moron
He does realize the Bucks limited Boston to like 30% in the paint? Welcome to the Milwaukee Bucks. They challenge shots and rim protect like no one else in the league.
What should concern him is Giannis and Lopez didn’t have good offensive games and Boston hit 18 long range shots yet still got blown out.
Perhaps give some credit to the Bucks and their defense, idiot.
I hope Milwaukee sweeps these assholes. Last time I checked the Bucks are defending champs. Boston has done nothing.
@MichiganPacker posted:No. No one watching the game would argue that those weren't dumb fouls. Chasing Al Horford at the half court line, trying to jump over the entire FT lineup after a FT miss, and another foul on Tatum 30 feet form the basket trying for a steal. Those happened in about a 4 minute period.
Giannis settled down after that and played incredibly smart basketball. 3 years ago that type of game from Giannis is a loss, but he's evolved to be able to dominate games even when he's struggling to generate his own offense.
Jevon Carter having to play in place of George Hill is the biggest blessing in disguise one can imagine. He was +25 in 21 minutes.
This is bs from X4’s resident hall monitor. I appreciate your in-game analysis and anyone who would defend that series by Giannis doesn’t know basketball. Fact is despite his triple double and that crazy backboard self-assist he didn’t play well. Other Bucks were off too but as someone noted above Carter has been vital and Portis came through as did Holliday.
MP’s analysis during the game is one of the best things on the forum. I find his assessment to be fair and honest. I don’t think he’s having any issue enjoying the game. He’s just calling it like he sees it, and he sees it with crystal clear vision.
It’s real time analysis. Ups and downs. Who cares? Not like MP2 isn’t a Bucks fan.
Jayson Tatum is an elite offensive player. He's not a terrible teammate, but the knock on him over the last few years is that he'd rather score 40 and lose than score 20 and win. What turned the Celtics season around was a commitment to defense after January and Tatum and Brown playing less hero ball to close games out.
Tatum is still capable of coming back and averaging an efficient 35 a game to help the Celtics win this series, but he has to do it against Holiday, Matthews, and Carter with Lopez and Giannis waiting to clean things up at the rim. That's a lot different than doing it against the Nets "defense." That defense included the corpse of Blake Griffin, Bruce Brown, Goran Dragic, a superstar who barely puts effort into anything off the ball when things are going good (Irving), and one of the top 20 players ever who has only played 90 games the last three years combined because of injuries and whose coach was playing him 40 minutes + a game in the regular season so they could sneak into the play-in round (Durant).
By the way, was there a worse NBA in recent history than the Sixers esssentially trading Jayson Tatum and another first round pick for Markelle Fultz? I know they traded draft picks, but the Sixers had the first pick and took Fultz over Tatum (and Lonzo Ball). For all the discussion about how the Sixers process has failed miserably (they'll end up with Embiid and a declining Harden at 50 million a year after all that), does anyone not think that Embiid, Tatum, and Simmons not get to multiple NBA Finals? The 2018-19 Sixers would have had Embiid, Simmons, Tatum, Butler, and Tobias Harris.
@YATittle posted:This is bs from X4’s resident hall monitor.
Hey fuck stick. Stop stealing taxpayer money and STFU.
Tatum had a half a dozen contested shots (misses or blocks) in the paint area yesterday. Against Brooklyn those were easy conversions. The difference is you have Giannis and Lopez patrolling the paint and Portis goes 6’10” and is a willing and active defender and rebounder.
Pretty easy to score 30+ a game when an undersized Bruce Brown is defending you.
The crazy thing about yesterday’s game is Matthews and Lopez did not shoot well from 3, and Giannis didn’t have a lot of points or FT attempts yet the Bucks dominated. The dilemma for Boston is if you want to give extra attention to 34 he’s capable of kicking it out to guys like Portis and Pat C and Allen for good looks on the perimeter. If they aren’t contested shots their shooting percentage should be decent.
I know they are different teams, but much like Chicago I’m not sure Boston can win if Tatum doesn’t go for 35-40. Horford is solid but he’s like 110 years old. Brown is decent but Matthews and Carter and Holiday are giving him no room to operate. Smart is good defensively but he won’t get easy looks and if he’s hurt that really limits his game.
I know I’ve said this a million times, but it’s tough to beat a team like Milwaukee 4 out of 7. Sure, they might have a bad game or two, but several? Not very likely. Now that Milwaukee took game 1 the Celtics have to win 4 out of 6. That’s going to be a real challenge and if I’m the Bucks I am playing with house money for game 2. You beat Boston again and my guess is the Celtics may just fold. One game at a time but Milwaukee has a golden opportunity to put their boot on their throat.
The Celtics are going to try to treat Giannis like they did Durant. Basically, go "Detroit Pistons Jordan Rules" and beat the crap out of him every time he drives. It's the same thing the Heat do - you know the officials can't call everything, so foul him 25 times and assume only 7-8 will get called.
The difference is that Kevin Durant is 6'10" and even though he's listed at 240 by the Nets, his real weight is probably closer to 215 (he was listed at 225 for the Olympics). He's deceptively strong, but he's still a stick.
Giannis is 6'11" and about 245, but he looks like he's been chiseled from granite.
Colliding with Durant 10 times a game wears Durant down because he is the more frail guy in the collision. Colliding with Giannis 10 times a game wears him down, but it also hurts you a lot more. It's like the difference between playing an NFL game on grass (Durant) vs. Astroturf (Giannis). The grass gives when you fall on it, astroturf doesn't.
Guess we will have more shots of Smart looking like his arm or leg is about to be amputated.
@PackerHawk posted:Guess we will have more shots of Smart looking like his arm or leg is about to be amputated.
Marcus Smart flopping compilation from yesterday.
There were a couple of plays yesterday where Giannis and Robert Williams met at the rim and Williams basically got throttled. He’s likely their best interior defensive guy. The problem is he’s probably 6’9” and 230 and he’s easily giving up 2-3 inches and 15-20 pounds on Giannis. While that may not seem like much of a difference, the power and force and aggression is sort of reminiscent to Shaq where unless you were Hakeem or Yao you absorbed way more contact on the receiving end.
Not to mention Giannis plays with reckless abandon and energy and seems to get stronger as the game goes on. It’s like Ron Dayne in the second half of games. You grow tired trying to tackle the guy because he just wears you out physically. Giannis wore them out yesterday.
Theis, Horford, and Williams are all about 6’9” in terms of height. All in that 230-240 range. That won’t get it done against a frontline of Portis and Lopez and Giannis. Not unless Boston is hitting a bunch of 3s and drawing a lot of charges.
@Pikes Peak posted:Smart may be out Tuesday
I was expecting a funeral notice the way he was acting yesterday.
Paul Pierce in a wheelchair thought it was a bit much.
I hope they wheel him out there for game 2.
Smart is shooting 29% from 3 in the postseason. Need him to keep jacking up and missing shots.
@Tschmack posted:I hope they wheel him out there for game 2.
Smart is shooting 29% from 3 in the postseason. Need him to keep jacking up and missing shots.
Yes. He's Eric Bledsoe on steroids both in terms of being a great defender and providing no floor spacing whatsoever on offense.
Smart is 11-38 in the playoffs. He’s taking almost 8 long range shots a game.
During the regular season he shot 33% from 3. Hardly spectacular.
You take out the game in Milwaukee a month ago where he shot 7-12 he’s he’s 20-69 in his last 10 games. Basically 28% from 3.
Boston’s problem is he’s not really a PG and he’s facing a guy in Holiday who might be the toughest and most physical one on one backcourt defender in the league. In addition to missing all of those shots in game 1, he only had 6 assists and had 3 turnovers. If he’s really hobbled, I expect Jrue to abuse him tonight.
I just read Smart is ruled out for game 2 tonight
Yep, Smart is out for tonight's game with a thigh contusion.