WASHINGTON D.C. – Brook Lopez and Pat Connaughton stood underneath the basket closest to the Milwaukee Bucks bench shortly before the opening tip-off in the Bucks’ 104-101 victory over Washington Friday night, their arms extended high over their heads and hands waving, trying to get the attention of Khris Middleton as he shed his red warmups across the court.
They laughed, because Middleton didn’t see them – or if he did, he definitely wasn’t going to head over.
So as the starting 10 players gathered around halfcourt, Lopez came off the sideline and gave Middleton a hug – and pointed to a lonely Connaughton, still stationed under the basket, waiting for an acknowledgement from his longtime teammate.
“It was so surreal,” Lopez said of the experience. “It was weird. But it was a fun experience, too. Obviously I miss him, we miss him.”
Before that, though, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Middleton shared a quick embrace on the center court logo in Capital One Arena.
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“Happy to see him out there,” Antetokounmpo said through a broad smile after the game. “He looks weird with that jersey on. He looks weird with that jersey on. He does not make that jersey look good at all. But it’s funny. We had a few laughs on the court. I miss him. I definitely miss that guy.”
BOX SCORE:Bucks 104, Wizards 101
For his part, Middleton found it fitting the first game of his post-Milwaukee career was against the Bucks.
“It is funny how things work out, how my first game is going to be against my old team,” Middleton told the Journal Sentinel the day before the game with a smile. “But it’s going to be fun. They’re in a different stage of their season, we’re in a different stage of our season. And, weird as it may seem, to me, I’m just trying to approach it as a normal game. I played against a lot of those guys when they were on different teams, except for Giannis. Brook, Pat, a couple of those guys.
“But we played against it in practice every day so I think that’s what more it will feel like. It’ll feel like a practice that’s official. So, I’m excited. I get to talk a little trash with some of those guys, get to bump ‘em like we normally do but now it’s fouls called. It’ll be fun. It’ll be a fun night.”
Middleton was right on, as he drew a first half foul on Lopez that resulted in two free throws – with Lopez signaling to the referees Middleton pushed off with a forearm. He then stepped in front of Antetokounmpo to draw an early charge. Later in the game, Antetokounmpo extracted a measure of revenge as he buried his right shoulder into Middleton’s chest on a left-hand drive to go the line himself.
Middleton, who started for the rebuilding Wizards, remained on a minute restriction (24). He scored nine first half points in helping the Wizards lead by as many as 16. Then, he was on the court late in the game to help Washington nearly pull off a 14-point fourth quarter comeback – giving his former teammates heart palpitations.
First, he won a jump ball over Kevin Porter Jr. and hit a three-pointer that drew the Wizards to within 102-101 with 61 seconds left.
“I knew that was going in, too,” Lopez said. “I was like ‘here we go, man, we we go.'”
Going back the other way, with Antetokounmpo fouled out, Lopez posted up Middleton and eventually drew a foul from Bilal Coulibaly. Like he did in tight victory at Minnesota on Feb. 12, Lopez coolly hit his two free throws, giving the Bucks a 104-101 lead with 38.5 seconds remaining.
“We just say we need you to be ‘Brooklyn’ – that’s his nickname – and he knows exactly what that assignment means,” Bucks head coach Doc Rivers said of Lopez, the Nets’ all-time leading scorer. “Go down on the post, take your time, make a shot or get fouled. The reason we like him there is because he’s such a great free throw shooter. So you can’t foul him.”
Coming out of a timeout, the Wizards put the ball in Middleton’s hands and his driving layup attempt with 33 seconds left was blocked by Lopez.
“I was just trying to time it up,” Lopez said. “It was weird seeing him go down, put it in the paint. I don’t know, I think it was (Kyle Kuzma), I can’t remember honestly, did a great job of getting him off the three, getting to his spot and staying in the play; kind of taking that one side away from him so he had to go to that one shot to where I could time it and get to it.”
Kuzma missed a three-pointer that could have sealed the win, and then coming out of a timeout, Middleton began to move like he so often did in a Bucks uniform – gliding around a screen, setting up a rhythm three-pointer in the final seconds.
“We were terrified of it,” Antetokounmpo said with a smile. “How quick it flips. Usually, I’m like, ‘make it Khris!’ and today I was like ‘miss it Khris!’ Crazy.”
Only this time, the shot in front of the Bucks bench missed its mark, and the Bucks won. Middleton finished 4 of 10 for 12 points with five rebounds and an assist in his first game since Feb. 2.
“They gave me an opportunity to beat my old team, which I appreciate,” Middleton said of the end-of-game play calls. “Didn’t go the way I hoped it would’ve went. We ran two sets where I thought I got decent looks. Brook blocked one, the other one was a tough shot that maybe I could hit, maybe not, but you know, gotta be aggressive in those moments and live with the results.”
He said after the game he tried to block out the emotional aspect of seeing his former teammates across from him, and added that the short embraces before and after the game, “can’t really do the justice of how you really want to talk and what you really want to say, especially with al of people around. I’m a pretty private person. But at some point I know I’ll be able to catch up with a lot of those guys, have a lot of conversation and laughs and stories and what not.”
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Third quarter surge, defense keys victory for the Bucks
Playing without Damian Lillard and Bobby Portis Jr. – and with Antetokounmpo on a strict minutes restriction – the Bucks came into Washington shorthanded offensively. And it showed, as the team struggled to put points on the board throughout the night, and particularly when Antetokounmpo was off the court.
The star’s foul trouble didn’t help, either, as he played three fewer minutes than planned (22).
But after slogging through a first half in which they trailed 56-50, the Bucks scored 34 points in the third quarter and held the Wizards to 19 points.
“Going in the first half we were going through the motions,” Antetokounmpo said. “We wasn’t moving the ball the way I would like to, we wasn’t getting downhill, we just was not imposing our will. At all. There was times that we did, but not as much. So starting the third quarter, I think they scored maybe like (19) points, so defensively we were great, offensively we were getting downhill, attacked them in transition, creating threes. So I think we did a better job of just imposing our will in the third quarter.
That effort was turning point of the game, as the Bucks were outscored 26-20 in the fourth to barely hold on.
“I’ll take the win,” Rivers said. “It’s a back-to-back off a tough one last night. We got in at 3:15 in the morning. We have what, Bobby out, Giannis out basically because he was in foul trouble all game, Dame out, Pat gets hurt. (Taurean Prince) out. We had a lot of guys out. So to win the game, we’ll take it.”
Antetokounmpo fouls out in fourth quarter
Antetokounmpo played on the second night of a back-to-back, but it was under minute restriction as he continued to work his way back from a left calf strain that sidelined him over two weeks.
In 19 minutes, he played through foul trouble throughout the game to score 18 points on 6-of-9 shooting before eventually recording his sixth foul. His greatest impact came out of halftime, though, as he aggressively went to the rim in the opening three minutes to score five points and help the Bucks erase a six-point deficit at the break.
Two free throws gave the Bucks a 62-60 lead – their first advantage since the opening basket of the game – and his team didn’t look back in eventually leading by as many as 14 in the early fourth quarter.
But Antetokounmpo also showed his rust from his time away rehabbing, as he turned it over seven times – the last of which came when he lost his dribble trying to take Wizards forward Alex Sarr off the dribble. That led to a Sarr basket on the other end and trimmed the Bucks lead to 100-92.
Antetokounmpo tried to go right back to the basket, but Kyshawn George blocked his shot attempt and Antetokounmpo fouled him immediately afterward. The whistle sent him to the bench for good with 3:36 to go in the game.
“I think part of it is he’s on this minute restriction and we’re yanking him in and out,” Rivers said. “I think that’s hard for him. But we’re going to continue with it regardless and see if we can figure out a way in this stretch of limitations, can we figure out a better way of subbing him to get him a better rhythm.”
It wasn’t hard to notice the 30-year-old was mindful of his muscle, however.
With a couple minutes left in pregame warmups, Antetokounmpo went and got two heat packs taped around his left knee and calf. The arena, which also houses the NHL’s Capitals and was sparsely occupied, was chilly throughout the contest.
During timeouts Antetokounmpo would stretch and keep his leg loose, and when not in the game he would keep the calf wrapped and avoid sitting for prolonged periods.
“Obviously coming back from this injury, trying to be smart as much as I can. I hadn’t played for like 18 days, trying to get my rhythm back. So slowly, slowly, I can get that. Get my wind back, get my rhythm back, and as the goes on, feel better,” Antetokounmpo said.
“I feel like anybody that’s been out with an injury for three weeks coming back will have a minute restriction. Which is kind of interesting for me because I have maybe one time or two time in my career I’ve had one game with a minute restriction. So it’s kind of interesting to me to have multiple games of minute restriction but you know, I gotta do what I gotta do. I had the injury out of nowhere last year so just gotta be smart, take care of my body; so if I have to do a little bit of games, a few games with a minute restriction I will.”
Jordan Poole has quiet night for Wizards
The Milwaukee native scored 42 points in his last game before the all-star break on Feb. 12 and had a 45-point game on Feb. 7. He averaged 28.6 points on 22.2 field goal attempts in his final five games heading into the break, despite shooting just 25.4% from behind the three-point line.
And in his two previous games against the Bucks, Poole scored 26 and 31 points, respectively.
But on Friday night, the 25-year-old was limited to 11 points on 3 of 11 shooting. He was 0 -for-5 from behind the three-point line.
Five numbers
3: Games left in which point guard Ryan Rollins can be active after Friday’s game. The Bucks have 27 regular-season games remaining. Rollins is a two-way player, and players signed to those deals can only be active for 50 games in a season – but Rivers said there is a chance the team makes a roster move to fully guarantee Rollins’ deal for the rest of the season. The team currently has one open roster spot.
4-5: Bucks record without Bobby Portis Jr. this season. Portis will miss the next 24 games due to a suspension for violating the league’s anti-drug program.
6-4: Bucks record without Damian Lillard.
5-6: Bucks record in the second games of back-to-backs.
12-15: Bucks record on the road. They have not been .500 this season since starting the year 1-1 on Oct. 27. They were 18-22 on the road last season. From 2018-23 they were one of the best teams on the road in the NBA, compiling a 123-74 (62.4%) record away from Fiserv Forum.
Damian Lillard ruled out
The Bucks scratched all-star point guard Damian Lillard, however, after he 33 minutes on Thursday. He was just 2-for-12 from the field overall but was 9 of 10 from the free throw line in scoring 15 points vs. the Clippers. He said he first felt his hamstring tighten against Philadelphia on Feb. 9 but wanted to try and help the team win against Golden State on Feb. 10. He sat out against Minnesota on Feb. 12 before participating in the three-point contest and two all-star games on Feb. 15-16.
“I think what Dame has found out is that he’s old, and when you party the entire all-star weekend, he just can’t hang the way he used to,” Bucks head coach Doc Rivers said with a smile before the game. “And so, he’s out. You can leave it any way you want to. I mean, he was the host of the all-star game, and he was going and doing the three-point shooting contest. That’s old man stuff, I’m telling you, man. Golly, it’s not like five years ago is it?”
Is Giannis playing?
He is available to play, but on a minutes restriction. Antetokounmpo began the day as probable after he was on the court for the first time since Feb. 2 in a win over the Clippers on Thursday.
What time is the Bucks game?
The game is scheduled to tip-off at 6 p.m. CT.
What channel are the Bucks on?
The game will be broadcast locally on FanDuel Sports Network Wisconsin with Dave Koehn and Marques Johnson on the call. Gabe Neitzel will fill in for Koehn on WTMJ Radio and the BMO Bucks Radio Network.
Bucks injury report
- Bobby Portis Jr., out (league suspension)
- Damian Lillard, out (right hamstring strain return to play injury management)
- Taurean Prince, out (left ankle sprain)
- Giannis Antetokounmpo, probable (left calf strain)
Bucks probable starting lineup
- Guards: Ryan Rollins., AJ Green
- Forwards: Kyle Kuzma, Giannis Antetokounmpo
- Center: Brook Lopez
Bucks vs. Wizards odds, over/under
Milwaukee is a 6.5-point favorite over Washington, and the over/under for the game is set at 229.5 points per BetMGM.
