The Bucks and the Suns eye a series advantage in Game 5.
PHOENIX — Unlike the majority of the league’s fanbase, Milwaukee Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo resisted the urge to rewatch and savor his classic block on Deandre Ayton in Game 4 of the NBA Finals.
“When you think about winning, you go to the extreme,” Antetokounmpo said. “I cannot explain the play, but at the end of the day that’s in the past. When you talk about the past, that’s your ego talking. I appreciate the moment. Great moment. We’ve got to move on.”
This year’s NBA Finals participants subscribe to similar lines of thinking heading into Saturday’s Game 5 at Footprint Center in Phoenix. That’s likely because both teams understand the historical significance of Game 5, and what’s at stake.
When The Finals are tied at 2-2, the winner of Game 5 goes on to win the series 72.4% of the time (21-8 record), and the teams seizing 3-2 advantages at any point win the series 80.9% of the time (38-9).
So forget about the classic performances we all witnessed in Game 4 from both Devin Booker (42 points) and Khris Middleton (40 points), which marked just the fourth time in Finals history that opposing players each tallied 40 or more in the same game.
“At this stage, you don’t really watch any film or game with that kind of just like, ‘let-me-kick-back-and-enjoy-it’ mentality,” Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer said. “We’ve watched many of the clips multiple times trying to figure out what we can do better. Can we make sure we’re executing whether it’s in the last two minutes, last five minutes? Really, the whole game? It’s just more looking at it from that critical lens. What do we need to be prepared for? What do we need to do?”
Paul, Suns look to bounce back at home after two straight losses.
In the Bucks’ case, they hope to duplicate performances from the last two games, which enabled them to even up the series after falling behind 2-0.
Phoenix led by nine points with 11:42 left to play in Game 4 only to watch Middleton take over with a 14-point outburst down the stretch, with Antetokounmpo’s monster blocked shot providing the exclamation point on the 109-103 victory.
Booker rebounded from a shaky outing in Game 3, in which he shot 3 of 14 for just 10 points, to score a game-high 42 points in a losing effort.
Milwaukee took 19 more shots, led by 12 on the offensive glass, committed 12 fewer turnovers and scored 19 more points off miscues to win the game despite shooting 11.1% worse than Phoenix from the field. It’s been 37 years since a team won in The Finals (1984, Boston Celtics) when shooting that much worse than their opponent.
Such an anomaly is just one component of the “hard” Suns coach Monty Williams describes in explaining the effort his team needs to win two more games and clinch their first championship.
“You guys heard what coach said: ‘Everything you want is on the other side of hard,’” Booker said. “We know that if we want to do what we want to do as a team, it’s not going to be easy at all. Just get that out of your head, embrace the moment and understand that this is it. It’s going to be tough, but you’re going to have to overcome obstacles.”
Uncharacteristic turnovers from point guard Chris Paul have been one of the Suns’ latest roadblocks.
In addition to producing his lowest scoring output in Game 4 (10 points) since the first round, Paul turned over the ball a game-high five times. To put it into perspective, Paul committed 24 turnovers over the first 15 games of the playoffs before turning it over 15 times over his last three outings.
Williams called Paul’s struggles “a blip on the screen.”
Paul scored 55 points combined in Games 1 and 2 of The Finals, but has produced just 29 points in his last two games. Paul is struggling to connect on the long ball, too. He knocked down 14 of 20 from 3-point range over a three-game stretch from Phoenix’s closeout game of the Clippers in the Western Conference finals through the first two games of the NBA Finals, yet he’s 1 of 6 since.
“In this league, when you play long enough, you have to have a short memory,” Paul said. “You can’t dwell on it, win or lose. If you win by 20, if you lose by 20, you start back over 0-0. You go from there. That’s sort of always been the mindset.”
Bucks show their tenacity to fight back from another 2-0 deficit.
Phoenix continues to prove it works, having captured victories in eight of its 10 home games this postseason.
But the Suns host a Milwaukee team that appears to be gaining confidence after bouncing back from a pair of 2-0 series deficits this postseason.
The Bucks have put together three consecutive games with fewer than 10 turnovers, which registers as a season-best streak, as they’ve decreased turnovers from 13 per game over the first three rounds of the postseason to nine per game in The Finals. They’ve outscored the Suns 39-9 on second-chance points over the last two games after finishing the first two contests deadlocked 26-26 in that department.
The Bucks also ran roughshod over the Suns in Game 4, outscoring them 15-0 in fast break points to build a 25-point advantage over the last two games.
Before the playoffs commenced, Milwaukee had never enjoyed multiple individual 40-point games in the same postseason. The Bucks are now up to four such performances; three from Antetokounmpo and one by Middleton, who is shooting 42% from 3-point range in his team’s wins and 21% in losses.
Middleton said he’s prepped for Game 5 with the “same focus, same intent we’ve been having this whole run. Stay locked in, play the right way, compete, play as hard as we can. That’s it.”
As for the Suns, Mikal Bridges said Game 5 registers as “a must-win game.”
“It’s our most important game because it’s our next game,” Bridges said. “So, we’ve just got to go out there, play Suns basketball for 48 minutes and win the game. It’s not going to be easy. You’re just not going to sweep a team or win in five or anything like that. It’s going to be a tough series, and we’re prepared for it.”
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Michael C. Wright is a senior writer for NBA.com. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on Twitter.
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