MILWAUKEE — It happened slowly. And still, there was nothing Cavaliers coach J.B. Bickerstaff could do to stop it.
The Bucks opened the second half of their 117-102 victory over the Cavaliers on Friday night with a 23-2 run. And while the term “run” implies something that happened quickly, there was nothing sudden about Friday’s. It took seven minutes and 50 seconds of game time for the Bucks to tally those 23 points. In real-time, the 23-2 stretch took more than 17 minutes to unfold.
After Bucks guard Jrue Holiday scored the first five points in the initial 90 seconds of the third quarter, Bickerstaff took a timeout to help his team get refocused. When the Bucks methodically managed a 7-2 run over the next three minutes of game time to cut the Cavaliers’ 11-point halftime lead down to a single point, Bickerstaff took another timeout to try to help his players jumpstart their offense.
For Bickerstaff and the Cavs, nothing worked. The Bucks’ second-half defense was just too focused and effective. The Cavaliers managed just 10 points in the entire third quarter as the Bucks turned up the defensive pressure, fueling a massive comeback after trailing, 63-52 at halftime.
“It felt like there was an urgency to the way we defended,” Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer said. “There was activity, purpose. The guys just, they were fantastic. And when we get stops like that, any team is at their best when you can get a lot of stops and then try and play against a defense that’s not set. I’m really proud of the defense, particularly in the third quarter obviously.”
In the first half, the Cavaliers guards, Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell, got loose, combining for 38 of the Cavaliers’ 63 points on 14-of-26 shooting from the field. Jevon Carter and Jrue Holiday recorded three personal fouls each trying to defend them. In the third quarter, Garland and Mitchell went a combined 1-of-7 from the field (two points) and committed three turnovers as the Bucks turned the tide and took over the game.
Look at how Carter and Holiday defended the first possession of the third quarter.
That is not how most teams would defend this action. Most defenders would not just jump from their own assignment to another player’s on the pass like Holiday did in the play above, but he can for reasons he detailed to The Athletic last season. And most of Holiday’s teammates would not be able to react to his unique maneuver as well as Carter does here to swap assignment.
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The Bucks have not typically been a switching team under Budenholzer, though he gave the Bucks’ guards bit more freedom to do so in the second half on Friday night. This action in particular is not one that most coaches, especially Budenholzer, would suggest defending that way. But Holiday and Carter made it happen, showing how two great defenders can turn up the pressure and play off each other to make it harder on their opponent.
“I think we just picked up the intensity,” Holiday said of the Bucks’ third quarter defense. “And they didn’t call as many fouls.”
With the officials allowing a little more physicality, Carter and Holiday were able to more easily force Cavaliers turnovers. On this play, Carter pressured Garland as he tried to get into the Cavaliers’ halfcourt set, while Holiday got over the top of multiple screens to make it difficult for Mitchell to catch a pass in rhythm.
Even with the officials allowing the Bucks to play more physically, Holiday still picked up his fourth foul with 9:30 left in the third quarter and came out of the game shortly thereafter. Even as Holiday took a seat, the Bucks’ intensity did not change. Budenholzer went to Wesley Matthews off the bench, and the 15-year NBA veteran made sure there was no drop-off in the Bucks’ effort.
Watch how hard the Cavaliers had to work at the start of this Bucks’ defensive possession.
Carter started the possession by making Garland take his time to get the ball across the half-court line. Once Garland gave the ball up, Carter and Matthews perfectly execute a switch and denial on both guards that keep the Cavaliers from starting their offensive action until there is 10 seconds remaining on the shot clock.
Look where Mitchell has the ball. He’s closer to the half-court line than the 3-point line at the start of his final attack. Here’s the end of the possession.
Because Mitchell started that drive near half-court, Carter went underneath the first screen from Evan Mobley and got back in front of Mitchell by the time he found himself close enough to the basket to pull up for a 3. On the re-screen from Mobley, Carter went over the top of the screen, which kept Mitchell from attempting a pull-up 3 again. That forced Mitchell to drive into Antetokounmpo, the 2019-20 NBA Defensive Player of the Year.
To his credit, Mitchell smartly probed the Bucks’ defense and created what would have been an open look, or maybe even a dunk, on most nights. But not against these Bucks. Instead, Mobley needed to shoot over the top of Antetokounmpo while also dealing with Brook Lopez cheating off of Jarrett Allen from behind. With the Bucks’ two seven-footers protecting the rim, Mobley flipped up a wild shot and hoped for the best.
“We were aggressive,” Giannis Antetokounmpo said of the second-half defense. “We were making the right plays. We got a little bit lucky on our side to make some of our shots, but defensively, Brook was all over the place. I think the guards did a great job just making it as tough as possible, denying Garland and Donovan Mitchell a couple times. Brook was incredible. Brook contested every shot for us and the Cavaliers wasn’t able to score and it gave us momentum.”
As Antetokounmpo laid out, the Bucks do not wait to see what you are going to do offensively. They attack. And they do so in waves.
This is the reality for opposing offenses when the Bucks are locked in:
- At the point of attack, guards have to deal with Carter, one of the league’s most tenacious on-ball defenders, and Holiday, one of the league’s best overall defenders. Now that they’ve spent more than a dozen games together in the Bucks’ starting lineup now, they have started to read each other’s tendencies and work together to make the start of any possession difficult.
- If guards can beat either Carter or Holiday off the dribble, they get chased from behind by both players and forced further down into the lane with no outlets on the wing (if the Bucks’ help defenders act as instructed).
- With no other options and a shot clock running low, guards have to attack Antetokounmpo, a former Defensive Player of the Year, or Lopez, the guy the team thinks should be this year’s Defensive Player of the Year. Both of them love blocking shots.
And yes, Antetokounmpo can put up huge numbers on any given night as he did against the Cavaliers on Friday.
The Giannis Takeover. 😤
38 PTS | 9 REB | 8 AST | pic.twitter.com/0ppY3yMDtk
— Milwaukee Bucks (@Bucks) November 26, 2022
But everything in Milwaukee, including their 23-2 run to start the third quarter, is fueled by their league-best defense. And the team takes great pride in that.
“I think that they (the Bucks’ players) knew we probably weren’t our best in that first half,” Budenholzer said. “We fouled a lot. Gave up 61 points, 62, 63. And sometimes when we’ve done that in the first half, I think pride is a word that kicks in. I think that the group has amazing pride on the defensive end and we’ve had some good third quarters defensively and I think pride is part of that.”
(Photo of Darius Garland and Jrue Holiday: Michael McLoone / USA Today)
Source link: https://theathletic.com/3937504/2022/11/26/milwaukee-bucks-cavaliers-defense/
