The Milwaukee Bucks’ Giannis Antetokounmpo takes a shot over the Boston Celtics’ Jaylen Brown during … [+]
As far as the still-resting Boston Celtics were concerned, the Milwaukee Bucks and the Chicago Bulls could have played a full seven games and worn each other out in the process. Unfortunately, the undermanned Bulls just weren’t up to the task of extending their series on Wednesday, falling behind early in what ended up being a 116-100 Milwaukee win.
Milwaukee’s reward? They now must face a well-rested and finally healthy Celtics team. No other team had a more impressive first round than the Celtics, who completed their sweep of the Brooklyn Nets all the way back on Monday. That’s right, Boston will have nearly a full week of rest under their belts before their Eastern Conference semifinals series starts on Sunday afternoon.
The best news for the Celtics is that, reportedly, the Bucks will be without Khris Middleton for much of the series. One of the most underappreciated players in the NBA, nobody knows Middleton better than these Celtics, who have frequently found themselves on the wrong end of his most memorable scoring nights. However, Middleton sprained his MCL during the series against the Bulls, meaning—for the time being—the Bucks will have to survive without one of the league’s most notorious Celtics-killers.
Meanwhile, the Celtics are finally running into some good injury luck. Starting center Robert Williams returned from his meniscus injury during the Nets series and now has gotten some extra rest as he continues to work his way back to full strength.
The Celtics, in other words, are facing the Bucks at the exact right juncture. They should be favored given this, but that’s not at all to say that they’re going to have an easy task against this Milwaukee team. The Bucks didn’t lose against Chicago after they lost Middleton and, in fact, only ended up playing a single more game than Boston in their first-round postseason series.
That shouldn’t exactly be shocking, because Milwaukee has Giannis Antetokounmpo, and as long as that’s true they have a shot at winning a series against anyone. He’s a year removed from dragging Milwaukee to a championship and he once again was an MVP finalist during the regular season, although Nikola Jokic and Joel Embiid both have better odds this time around. In the Bucks’ series against the Bulls, he averaged 27.5 points, 14.5 rebounds and seven assists.
So, yes, Antetokounmpo’s supporting cast is slightly thinner with aging veterans like Brook Lopez and Jrue Holiday now forced into larger roles than the team would likely hope. That still doesn’t mean that if you asked the Celtics privately, some of them might have been hoping for the Bulls to have somehow found a way to survive after falling behind 3-1.
Instead, Boston players must remember what Marcus Smart said after the Celtics swept the Nets: “We have to have the mentality that we’re not the best team,” he said, “because once you get that mentality that you’re the best team, you start to get complacent and bad habits start to kick in.”
That’s for his teammates to worry about, however. For the rest of us, there’s no harm in admitting that the Celtics could have been handed a much worse second-round opponent than a Milwaukee team that will be without its second-most important player, possibly for the entire series. The Bucks might just stop here.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/hunterfelt/2022/04/27/the-boston-celtics-are-facing-the-milwaukee-bucks-at-the-perfect-time/