NEW YORK — Following a 116-94 loss to the New York Knicks, Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo made it clear he was upset with his team’s performance.
The Bucks have now dropped seven of their first nine games, which would be a disappointing enough start to a season to make any player mad, but in Antetokounmpo’s eyes, his disappointment wasn’t about the loss. His frustration stemmed from how the Bucks dropped Friday’s game in Madison Square Garden.
“Did we compete the previous game? Yes,” Antetokounmpo said. “Did we compete the two previous games, Cavs and Cavs? Yes. Did we compete today? No. That’s something you can control. If you’re going to go out there and you’re not going to compete, you’re not going to win the game.
“Sometimes you compete your ass off and you don’t win the game, but at least you give yourself a chance. We played great last night. We came to New York, we lost by 30. You gotta compete. Are we OK with not competing? I don’t know. I’m not OK with that s—. So, we gotta do a better job competing. We got Boston in two days. If you don’t compete, you’re going to lose by 30. Simple as that.”
With two projected starters — Khris Middleton (bilateral ankle surgery) and Gary Trent (back spasms) — out with injuries, Bucks coach Doc Rivers continued his search for consistent effort and improved athleticism as he changed the Bucks substitution pattern again on Friday.
The new staggering pattern utilized by Rivers left Antetokounmpo on the floor for all 12 minutes of the first quarter. The Knicks ran to a 32-25 lead and the Bucks surrendered five offensive rebounds that led to 10 second-chance points in the first nine minutes.
After a shaky start to the season on the defensive glass, the Bucks had cleaned up those issues in the last week, but the problems they dealt with during the first four games of the season reared their head again on Friday.
On this play, not only did Antetokounmpo and Bucks center Brook Lopez get beat to the basketball by Karl-Anthony Towns, but Taurean Prince also let Mikal Bridges cut in front of his face and get to the rim to convert the second-chance points.
A few minutes later, the Knicks’ offensive action forced several switches that put the Bucks into a compromised position. Still, Antetokounmpo made a great recovery play to block Jericho Sims at the rim. However, the Bucks could not corral Antetokounmpo’s block and it led to a dunk for Sims anyway.
On the next offensive possession, the Bucks gave up another offensive rebound, which eventually led to a midrange jumper for Josh Hart.
Under Tom Thibodeau, the Knicks are going to compete as hard as possible for 48 minutes every night. On Friday, the Bucks did not match that effort.
“We gotta compete,” Antetokounmpo said. “We gotta do a better job competing. At the end of the day coming to New York, playing the way we’re playing, teams will not just give us games. Teams will not feel bad about us and just don’t compete.
“We have to come out with the mentality that we have to compete for every possession. One possession at a time. Every ball, every loose ball. Whenever the ball is on the floor, we gotta get our body on the floor and try to get that ball. Put our body on the line. We gotta do a better job competing. We didn’t compete at all. That’s the bottom line.”
While not competing at the same level often manifests itself most visibly on the defensive glass, there are also other ways for that problem to show up on the other side of the floor. That happened on Friday night as well.
One night after putting together a crisp offensive performance against the Utah Jazz, the Bucks looked listless on offense as the Knicks physical defense kept the Bucks from getting where they wanted to be. The Knicks blew up the Bucks’ offensive actions by pushing them off spots where they were supposed to be.
Look at this first-quarter possession:
Some of the Bucks’ poor execution is on Andre Jackson Jr. figuring out where he is supposed to go and what he is supposed to be doing as a starter. But rewatch the play to see how far the Knicks push each member of the Bucks off their respective spots.
OG Anunoby beats Antetokounmpo to the left block and then pushes him from the block out to the 3-point line. Prince has a 4-inch height and 25-pound weight advantage on Jalen Brunson and yet, he moves backward throughout the possession. Bridges avoids Jackson’s screen and then forces Damian Lillard to get the ball nearly 40 feet from the rim. Towns beats Lopez to the spot and then keeps him away from creating a safe outlet for Prince.
The Knicks fought for every inch on the floor, and the Bucks weren’t willing to do the same thing.
“A better team tonight than we played (Thursday) night and to accomplish what we accomplished it takes a little bit more work,” Lillard said of what the Knicks did to slow down the Bucks’ offense. “Your pace has to be better, you screen harder, you have to get to spots faster. Your purpose in each part of our execution has to be better.
“When you have a team be physical — they’re a little bit older so they understand what’s coming at ‘em — I think we just didn’t do a good enough job of fighting for our spots and having a good enough pace, and they kind of was able to disrupt what were trying to do. And that limited us getting into the paint and them having to react and the ball going out and hopping around and giving you trouble.”
In the end, that led to the Bucks scoring 74 points in the first 40 minutes before Rivers pulled his regular rotation players with 8 minutes, 23 seconds remaining and the Knicks leading by 28.
The Bucks also added in a few possessions of poor transition defense.
Rather than sprinting back as soon as the shot went up on the above second-quarter possession, the Bucks lingered in the paint as Lopez’s floater bounced high off the rim.
“There are a lot of things that we can clean up and do better. It starts with competing,” Antetokounmpo said. “We gotta compete. As I said, teams won’t feel bad about us. They want us to keep on losing. They’re not going to be (like), ‘Oh, yeah, they’re five games below .500. Oh, let’s get them back on track, so they can make the playoffs.’ It’s not going to work that way.
“We gotta go out there and earn it. And don’t take it for granted. You don’t have a lot of times in your life that you are going to come in MSG and compete. I feel like sometimes, we take that s— for granted. I’m a guy that doesn’t take it for granted and I try to compete whenever I can.”
When asked about his head coach, Antetokounmpo made it clear that he believes Rivers is doing what he needs to do to put the team in the right position. Antetokounmpo pointed out that Rivers is attempting to motivate the team, making tweaks to the offensive and defensive game plans, and making changes to the rotation to help keep lineups balanced.
But Antetokounmpo knows that it comes down to him and his teammates. That means he needs to do what he can as a leader to keep the team motivated to compete at a higher level and claw back from this poor start to the 2024-25 season.
“You gotta empower your teammates. You gotta empower your teammates and you gotta be honest with them. You gotta tell them the truth. You gotta keep yourself accountable also — try to play better, try to figure out ways to be more efficient, get to spots that you can help your teammates more. That’s pretty much it.
“But at the end of the day, win or lose, you gotta go in next practice, next game with the same mentality. Your teammates can never see your head down. As the leader of this team, your head cannot be down. You can be frustrated at times. For sure. I’m frustrated. If you’re not frustrated with losing, get the f— out of here. Simple as that. But at the end of the day, we have another one in two days. Gotta be ready.”
(Photo of Giannis Antetokounmpo and OG Anunoby: Brad Penner / Imagn Images)
