Despite being victims of a hot shooting Blazers team, the Bucks were able to outlast Portland, 115-107. Giannis Antetokounmpo and Jabari Parker were major influences on the action yet again.
Parker led all Bucks scorers with 27 points. Despite Antetokounmpo only tallying 15 points on the night, his fingerprints were all over the box score yet again, as he posted his second triple-double of the year with a 15 point, 12 rebound and 11 assist performance.
Right off the bat, Portland controlled all facets of the game. They quickly jumped out to a nine point lead. The Bucks would make their way back into the game, tying things up and even pulling ahead at times. But as the second quarter wore on, shooting from beyond the arch, something Portland does so well, granted them a 58-51 lead at halftime.
In the first 24 minutes of play, the Blazers connected 12-of-22 times from deep, five of which came from Damian Lillard. Against a team like the Bucks that defends the perimeter so well, Portland was able to create their opportunities. Head Coach Terry Stotts attributed his team’s style of play as reason behind their success in that area of the game.
“That’s one of the things we do,” Stotts said. “We shoot a lot of threes when we move the ball and Milwaukee is a team that gives up a lot of threes, even though they defend it well. Moving the ball to the weak side and the extra pass usually created an opportunity for the 3-point shot.”
Milwaukee would find itself behind until the 8:03 mark in the third quarter when a jumper from Jabari Parker knotted the score up at 62 apiece. With a little over a minute to go in the period, they made their jump as a flush of points from Parker and Greg Monroe boosted the team, making it 85-76 in the Bucks advantage heading into the fourth.
Despite being known for having trouble holding onto leads in late-game situations, the Bucks showed their maturity by not relinquishing the lead the remainder of the game. Portland would scrape its way back with 4:16 to go when Allen Crabbe swished home a 3-pointer, which made it a 101-99 game, but Milwaukee never broke. Matthew Dellavedova responded with a quick 5-0 run led by himself, and a dunk from Jabari Parker extended the lead to nine.
The closest Portland would get after that point was four with 56 seconds remaining, but once again, Dellavedova, who finished with 17 points on the night, responded on the other end with a scooping layup to put the Bucks up six and secure the victory.
Jason Kidd focused on his team’s ability to recognize previous failures as reasons they held the Blazers off.
“I think we tend to learn from our mistakes as a whole,” said Kidd. “We were in that situation with San Antonio with it being a close game. We didn’t turn the ball over coming down the stretch. We got shots, we made shots and we made stops on the other end. This group tends to pay attention to their mistakes and quickly make the adjustments.”
Bench play was also a big role for the Bucks. Michael Beasley, Greg Monroe and Malcolm Brogdon all scored double figures on the night, tallying 50 total bench points.
“We did our job,” said Beasley. “We stuck to the game plan and executed on the defensive side. [We] moved the ball on the offensive side and when we do that, we’re a pretty hard team to stop.”
For the Blazers, Damian Lillard finished with a game-high 30 points. C.J. McCollum poured in 23 points and Allen Crabbe put up 14 points off the bench.