MILWAUKEE — Since Giannis Antetokounmpo turned into a perennial MVP candidate under Milwaukee Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer and started putting up massive numbers on offense, teams have needed to concoct comprehensive defensive game plans to slow down Antetokounmpo. A team’s normal base coverage will not work. Special game plans are necessary.
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“I’ve seen it all,” Antetokounmpo said following Thursday’s game. “I’ve played against double-teams. I’ve played against being double-teamed at half court. I’ve played against deny. I’ve played against double-team at the post. I’ve played against a wall. I’ve played against the best defender guarding me. I’ve played against people waiting for me in the paint. I’ve played against zone. I’ve played against box-and-1. Maybe I’m missing something, but you pretty much try to have the answers to the test.”
On Thursday against the Clippers, Antetokounmpo encountered something he had seen many times before and he aced the test by scoring 54 points in the Bucks’ 106-105 comeback victory.
In 37 minutes, Antetokounmpo made 21 of his 39 shots from the field, as well as 10 of his 15 free throws, on his way to his third 50-point outing of the season and the sixth 50-point game of his career. With that performance, he joined Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the only other player in Bucks’ franchise history to have three or more 50-point games in a single season. It was also his fifth game of the season with at least 45 points and 10 rebounds, which is the most in a season since Russell Westbrook tallied seven such games in his 2016-17 MVP season.
“He’s amazing,” Bucks wing Wesley Matthews said of Antetokounmpo. “He’s the MVP.”
Giannis continues his MVP agenda.
54 PTS | 19 REB | 2 AST | 54 FG% pic.twitter.com/IuCzZ4fPvT
— Milwaukee Bucks (@Bucks) February 3, 2023
While Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard served as the primary defender — the tip of the spear at the top of Nick Nurse’s wall — against Antetokounmpo as a member of the Toronto Raptors in the 2019 Eastern Conference finals, Clippers head coach Ty Lue opted for a different approach on Thursday. Instead of putting Leonard on Antetokounmpo, Lue defended the Bucks’ star with a strong center — 7-foot, 240-pound Ivica Zubac — playing deep in the paint at all times.
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If Antetokounmpo brought the ball up the floor, Zubac waited for him at the free-throw line, daring the two-time MVP to take a 3-pointer. If Antetokounmpo took a dribble inside the 3-point line, Zubac continued to back away from him and dared him to take midrange jumpers. If he drove all the way to the rim, Zubac backpedaled in a drop coverage, like Brook Lopez often does for the Bucks, and used his size to contest shots at the rim and keep Antetokounmpo from getting around him for easy dunks.
If the Bucks set a screen for Antetokounmpo, he went underneath it. If Antetokounmpo set a screen in a pick-and-roll or dribble handoff, Zubac sagged off Antetokounmpo, picked up the ballhandler in a deep drop coverage and denied the Bucks opportunities to find Antetokounmpo for easy alley-oop dunks. With Zubac playing so far off Antetokounmpo, the rest of the Clippers defenders could stay connected to their defensive assignments and take away Antetokounmpo’s playmaking options.
If Antetokounmpo wanted to help the Bucks score, the Clippers were going to force him to take a lot of shots. And that is exactly what he did.
“I just trust my skills, trust my instincts,” Antetokounmpo said. “I wasn’t good against it. I started the game 1-for-7. It was working. Sometimes, it works. Sometimes, it doesn’t work. At the end of the day, I try to be aggressive. I try to create for myself, try to create for my teammates and just trust my skills. I know it’s going to be a long game. I know that I’m going to be open for a lot of shots. I just have to shoot them with confidence and just hope for the best.
“But at the end of the day, no matter what the coverage is, I gotta be aggressive. I gotta try to get downhill, try to get to the free-throw line, try to create for my teammates, just trust all the work that I’ve put in.”
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Trailing by 21 points, 76-55, with 7:26 remaining in the third quarter, the Bucks completed their largest comeback of the season, but it didn’t happen quickly. They had to claw their way back into the game and eventually needed one last push, a 7-o run from Antetokounmpo, to take the lead in the final two minutes of the game.
With Zubac camped out in the paint, Antetokounmpo started his personal run by attacking the Clippers’ center off the bounce and drawing his fourth personal foul when Zubac center was slightly overzealous with his defensive aggression.
Two possessions later, Antetokounmpo had the ball in his hands again with a chance to attack Zubac and stepped into a jumper at the elbow.
When Antetokounmpo spoke with The Athletic earlier this week about how he wanted to see himself play moving forward, this was the exact shot he pantomimed — the midrange pull-up going to his left where he plants his right foot first — when speaking about his strengths.
“I believe part of my game is shooting midrange, I really believe it,” Antetokounmpo told The Athletic. “I believe I’m really good at it… You know how I say I always play within my strengths? I believe that’s part of my strength.”
On the Bucks’ next offensive possession, Antetokounmpo attacked Zubac off the bounce and drew the big man’s fifth personal foul, but he missed both free throws. Undeterred, Antetokounmpo came down the floor again, went right at Zubac to draw his sixth personal foul and disqualify the Clippers’ center from the game.
Given another attempt at the free-throw line, Antetokounmpo hit both and gave the Bucks a 106-105 lead, which ultimately ended up being the final score.
“I’m not scared of the line,” he said. “I was able to drive the ball again and get fouled and went to the free-throw line and trust my work and I was able to knock those two down. At the end of the day, in a situation like that usually, sometimes players get scared and they don’t want to back there.
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“At the end of the day, I’d rather miss four in a row — and obviously, I’m going to be upset — but at least I know I missed four in a row. I’m going to go the next day and try to work extremely hard at it and hope for the best the next time, but I try not to be scared of the moment. And I just trust my work and I hope most of the time, the outcome is going to be good.”
In the fourth quarter, Antetokounmpo outscored the Clippers (20-18). He scored those points through a real belief in his own skills and abilities, but he needed some help on the defensive side to hold the Clippers to 18 points in the final quarter. Two teammates delivered in a major way.
Matthews and Jrue Holiday had wanted to play together for years before Bucks general manager Jon Horst finally put them together on the same team by signing Matthews as a free agent in December of 2021 last season. They believed that their defensive skills and like-minded mentality would fit seamlessly together and provide strong defense on the wing against any team. And they were right, as they proved during the Bucks’ second-round series against the Celtics.
While Holiday was elected to his second All-Star team on Thursday night — and plays more than enough to once again put himself in consideration for a First Team All-Defensive honor — Matthews has received more limited playing time as Budenholzer tries to manage his minutes during the regular season and preserve him for the postseason. Whether that ends up being the right or wrong decision remains to be seen, but Matthews proved once again why he could be worth saving for the most important moments.
After Leonard hit a midrange jumper for a 105-99 lead with 3:52 remaining, the Clippers did not score again. Leonard went 0-for-5 from the field and his running mate Paul George went 0-for-3 in that same period with Holiday and Matthews providing the one-on-one defensive efforts. During those final four minutes, the Bucks’ defensive duo switched effortlessly and made the Clippers’ wings work for everything. Both Leonard and George love pull-up jumpers, but they struggled to find an easy one with Holiday and Matthews on them on the Clippers’ final two possessions.
While Leonard is an undeniably tough cover, Holiday admitted trying to keep it somewhat simple.
“Honestly, just trying to send him maybe to his weak hand, maybe that’ll do something,” Holiday said. “We know that if he gets it up in the air, that shot, for the most part, is pretty good. But I think maybe sending him left a little bit, trying to switch it up, stay on his right hand, contesting on his right side, maybe that threw him off.”
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Unable to find success against Holiday on the previous possession, the Clippers tried to get Matthews on Leonard for the final possession. And Holiday was more than happy to oblige.
“I love it,” Holiday said of switching with Matthews. “I actually really love it, just knowing that there’s no drop-off between me and Wes. I think that last possession they wanted to bring Wes into it and I’m like, ‘Go right ahead.’ I know sometimes I try to fight over and stay with my man, but I have a lot of trust in him.”
And Matthews showed why with a ridiculous eight-second isolation possession against Leonard.
“They’re great players, great scorers, but you play against time and score, play against tendencies and just do your best to put them in a tough situation,” Matthews said. “Obviously, those guys can score at any level and make tough shots, just gotta make it as uncomfortable as possible.”
With Antetokounmpo taking care of business on the offensive end and Holiday and Matthews pairing up to get stops on the defensive end, Milwaukee pulled out a tough victory at home for its sixth straight win and largest comeback of the season. The Bucks were tested by one of the few teams in the league that have the top-end talent necessary to truly make things difficult for them in the regular season and they came out on top.
And while Antetokounmpo was answering a question about his own scoring, he actually summed up the entire night quite well in his postgame presser.
“You have to trust your technique because the moment you start questioning yourself, it doesn’t really matter, you already lost the battle,” Antetokounmpo said. “As much as I trust myself, I know my team is going to put me in a spot to be successful. The answer to the test becomes easy.”
Antetokounmpo paused. Then continued: “Easier, not easy.”
The Bucks have been through tough games like this before, so they just leaned on those habits and trusted the lessons they’ve learned in recent years.
(Photo of Ivica Zubac and Giannis Antetokounmpo: Gary Dineen / NBAE via Getty Images)