PHOENIX – The Milwaukee Bucks continued their march to the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference as they won for the fifth time in six games with a 116-104 victory over the Phoenix Suns on Tuesday night at the Footprint Center.
The Bucks are the first team in the NBA to reach 50 wins this season and clinch a spot in the postseason.
“We made the playoffs?” Giannis Antetokounmpo asked facetiously with a smile. “No way! We did? Man! For real? Oh man, it feels good. Yeah, it feels good.
“Gotta keep on playing, keep on trying to compete, build good habits. I think the last three games we’ve played in playoff atmosphere, it’s really good for us. It’s really good for us to lose a game, to be down 10, come back to the game, be up 10, they came back and we kept our composure and win the game by 10. It was good. All on the road.
“It makes it stronger. I’m happy that we’re able to win and be the first team to clinch the playoffs.”
The Bucks remain three games ahead of the Boston Celtics in the loss column with a 50-19 record. The Suns dropped to 37-32.
Bucks first to clinch playoff berth
The Bucks have kept their eyes on the long-term goal all season, which has been playoff basketball. All the steps along the way, from roster changes to injury management to play style adjustments have been done with that mind. After ascending to the top spot in the Eastern Conference they’ve been asked about seeding and home court advantage, questions they’ve acknowledged but largely pushed aside with an eye on the bigger picture.
But on Tuesday, a piece of the bigger picture fell firmly into place as the Bucks became the first team in the NBA to formally punch their ticket to the 2022-23 postseason.
“We just mentioned it in the coaches locker room to appreciate this,” Bucks head coach Mike Budenholzer said. “Making the playoffs in this league is hard. You should never take anything for granted.
“We have a special team and our focus and our effort and kind of desire to just keep getting better, sometimes I just forget about celebrating and I need to improve and I need to get better.”
BOX SCOREBucks 116, Suns 104
There are still 13 games left in the regular season, and the focus does indeed turn a bit more squarely toward solidifying home court advantage. It is the next step in the process of getting to the playoffs on a roll.
“I think that we’ve been playing well,” Jrue Holiday said. “Obviously playoffs are like in the back of your mind but I feel like we’re about one game at a time and winning games and trying to execute and be better down the stretch.”
Wesley Matthews agreed.
“Just keep getting better every single day,” he said of what’s next for the Bucks. “Don’t take anything for granted, don’t take health for granted, taking care of your body, taking care of your mind and being ready to show up for work.”
Giannis Antetokounmpo posts back-to-back dominant games
Antetokounmpo returned to the court for the first time since March 5 on Monday night in Sacramento and scored 46 points in 34 minutes, and he backed that up with a 36-point night against the Suns on Tuesday. It was the fifth set of back-to-back games he’s played, and the Bucks are 10-0 in those games. (He has missed one or both games of four others, and the Bucks are 3-1 in the second game of those sets).
Phoenix struggled to slow down Antetokounmpo on the defensive side, especially when he drew two first quarter fouls on Suns center Deandre Ayton. That forced the Suns to put smaller players on the 7-footer, and they did about as well as expected.
Antetokounmpo scored 20 points in 15 first half minutes in helping the Bucks to a 57-48 lead at the break, making 7 of his 11 shots and 6 of 10 free throws. He also pulled down nine rebound and had five assists – all of which led to three-pointers.
He scored 14 second-half points and helped the Bucks hold off a late Suns charge by assisting a Wesley Matthews three-pointer and then scoring five straight points to keep game tied at 92.
Antetokounmpo nearly recorded a triple-double with eight assists to go with his 11 rebounds, but he was just 14 for 24 from the free throw line, however.
Second-chances and triples key to Bucks win
Phoenix came into the game as the seventh-best offensive rebounding team in the league, an area in which the Bucks have been victimized at times throughout the year – even as recently as their loss to Golden State (18 for 24 second-chance points) to start the road trip.
Suns head coach Monty Williams said it has become a focus for his team the last two years, and before the game he said it was an important part of what they need to do offensively. And the Suns were active in that area, but the Bucks matched that intensity as defensive rebounders and prevented Phoenix from owning an advantage in that area.
In fact, it was the Bucks who crashed the offensive glass harder and scored 19 second-chance points. The Suns meanwhile had just eight offensive rebounds for seven second-chance points.
“That was the game plan,” Jae Crowder said. “Just try to get extra possessions. These guys do a good job of crashing themselves from the corners. They killed us at home doing that and we were aware of it, so we just wanted to try to clean that up and try to continue to make those guys pay on that end on the offensive glass.”
And while the Bucks did not have a great shooting night from behind the three-point line (12 for 39) they still made four more than the Suns, an advantage that no number of Devin Booker and Chris Paul midrange shots could overcome. The Bucks are one of the best teams in the league in opponent three-point percentage, but the Suns also just didn’t put up that many (23) to increase their odds of pulling totally ahead after falling behind by 15.
Play of the game was Pat Connaughton’s fourth quarter corner three
The Bucks’ wing started in place of Khris Middleton and scored eight points on 2-of-6 shooting, but his second basket was huge With the game tied at 97 with 6:32 to go, Connaughton collected a pass from Joe Ingles in the corner and knocked down a three-pointer to put the Bucks up for good at 100-97. It kickstarted an 8-0 run, which allowed the Bucks to final put the Suns away.
Five numbers
9-1 Bucks record in the second game of back-to-backs.
“You might say that it’s a secret recipe to play better or to win a back-to-back but it’s not,” Antetokounmpo said. “Our body’s tired. Arriving to the hotel at 2:30 a.m. Playing one of the best offense in the league the night before, one of the fastest teams in the NBA that you have to sit down and guard and you have to move your feet. That is not easy.
“Then you wake up ad you don’t have an easy game. You’re playing the Phoenix Suns, which for me is probably a top three, one of the best teams in the West. You know they always play hard and they always compete. It’s not easy.
“It’s all effort now. It’s all in our mind. Are we going to go out there and try to fold and give up the game because we are tired and we’re a little bit sore? Or are we going to try and fight for it and put ourselves in position to win the game? This year wit the team that we have, we always try to fight for it.”
17 Third quarter points for Devin Booker, on 7-of-10 shooting. He helped pull the Suns back from 14 points down early in the quarter to just a 85-84 deficit heading into the fourth. The Suns put the ball in his hands as Deandre Ayton was sent to the bench with five fouls. Booker finished with 30 points.
23-3 Bucks record since Jan. 16.
16,000 Career points for Antetokounmpo when he notched his 12th of the night in the second quarter. He became the 115th player in NBA history to reach that plateau.
2/16/23 Date of Wesley Matthews’ last game. He suffered a calf strain against the Bulls that night and missed the next 10 games. Matthews returned against the Suns on Tuesday night.
“It was long. Longer than I expected it to be,” Matthews said. “But we’ve got a good team, everybody helped me out. And just keeping my mind right was the biggest thing. Keeping my mind right and just staying ready, staying on point and going out there and not thinking about it.”
Video of the game is Giannis’ 16,000th point
Only 115 players in NBA history have scored that many points in their career, and Antetokounmpo joined that club Tuesday night with a free throw in the second quarter. He is the all-time leading scorer in franchise history.
Khris Middleton held out
The Bucks held out Ingles in Sacramento for left knee injury management, as head coach Mike Budenholzer said “for him, long-term, and what we’re doing, this was important (to hold him out).”
The natural follow-up was if the move worked in tandem with Middleton, who did play vs. the Kings, sitting out in Phoenix.
“Yes,” Budenholzer said flatly.
Middleton has yet to play in a back-to-back this season.
Who do the Bucks play next?
Milwaukee returns home and will host all-star Tyrese Haliburton of Oshkosh and the Indiana Pacers at 7 p.m. Thursday at Fiserv Forum. Along with Haliburton (20.8 points, 10.4 assists), the Pacers get scoring from big man Myles Turner (18.0) and sharpshooter Buddy Hield (17.1). Former Bucks player Jordan Nwora is averaging 12 points off the bench for the Pacers.
