| 27 April 2010
(Photo by Gary Dineen/NBAE via Getty Images)
Milwaukee Bucks 111, Atlanta Hawks 104
In the first two games of this series, the Hawks were way too much for this Bogut-less Bucks team to handle. The defense of the Hawks was opportunistic and they were able to feed off their home crowd to play spectacular basketball.
But in the two games away from Atlanta, the Milwaukee Bucks have been the ones that are too much for their opponents. The Hawks are no longer full of bravado and defensive prowess. They aren’t flying high and showing why they’re the better seed in the playoffs. In the Bradley Center, the deer run the house and they have found ways to keep this Hawks team from making the same plays that made them look so impressive at home.
In Game Four, the Bucks weren’t able to dominate quite as much as they did in Game Three but their offense was equally as good. And that’s the difference between the Hawks from the first two games of this series and the last two games of this series – their defense isn’t effective when the Bucks are in the Bradley Center. This sort of reminds me of the Hawks-Celtics series from 2008 when the Hawks seemed lost in Boston and dominant in Atlanta. However, this time the roles are completely reversed.
Part of the problem with the Hawks defense is the way the Bucks are moving the ball and causing rotation problems. In this game, the Bucks did whatever they wanted. They were proficient in the way they scored in almost all facets of the offense. They scored on 62% of their isolation plays. They made 58% of their spot-up jumpers with seven of those being threes and six of those seven being from Chuck Delfino threes. They scored by cutting into the lane and getting easy hoops. (All of these stats from Synergy Sports. Seriously, it’s the best $30 you’ll spend all summer. Subscribe!)
Part of this is the Bucks being able to just knock down shots. Slow defensive rotations and confusing decisions made by the Hawks defenders ended up giving the Bucks a lot of room to operate. They didn’t have to worry about Josh Smith coming over to add to his highlight reel. They just calmly took jumpers until their little deer hearts were content. On Carlos Delfino’s six threes, he was wide-open on just about every one of them. This was created by dribble penetration on his side that the Hawks were just too slow to adjust to.
The Bucks had their three starting perimeter players carry the majority of the scoring load. In Game Two, Brandon Jennings was blocked all over the place but in Game Four, he made a lot of layups, runners and floaters. He was just too much for the Hawks to handle. He dribbled around until the Hawks were forced to switch a big guy out on him and then he drove the lane to score. Rinse, lather, repeat. Then there was Carlos Delfino and his assassinous shooting from outside and the relentless pursuit of the free throw line by John Salmons.
These three scores combined for 67 points and made the perimeter scoring of the Bucks too invasive for the Hawks.
Why The Bucks Won This Game
As good as all of their offense was, the best and most important part of it might be the work they did at the free throw line. It’s not just the fact that they got to the free throw line 11 more times than the Hawks or that they got to the line 16 times in the fourth quarter alone. The Bucks MADE their free throws during this game and probably won it because of their productivity. Overall, they made 28 of their 32 attempts. John Salmons made all ten of his attempts and even Illyasova made all four of his attempts off the bench. Milwaukee didn’t let the idea of free points escape them in this game.
Why The Hawks Lost This Game
It was a matter of defense if you can’t tell by now. The Hawks allowed the Bucks to shoot 55% from the field in this game. They only gave up seven threes in the game, which isn’t bad but they were all timely threes. And they put the Bucks on the free throw line 32 times. The Bucks averaged just 20 attempts per game during the regular season but were able to live there in Game Four. It was just an overall mediocre effort on defense.
Heading Into Game Five
If this IS like the Celtics-Hawks series from two years ago, then you should expect the Hawks to lay the wood to the Bucks in Game Five. The Hawks have established that they play so much better at home. They were 34-7 there in the regular season and just 19-22 away from it. They looked like an elite team in the first two games of this series at home and like the team that will be gone fishing early in the last two games. I think the home crowd will allow them to pull this game out.
Prediction: Hawks Go Up 3-2
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|
