Bucks Gaming secure first win, defeat Cavs Legion Gaming in OT

Bucks Gaming ended their regular season drought on Saturday, as they overcame Cavs Legion Gaming in overtime for a first win.

A tough schedule to start the NBA 2K League regular season led to a brutal series of losses for Bucks Gaming in recent weeks, but on Saturday the drought finally ended.

Heading into Week 4 of the season, Bucks Gaming’s three previous opponents and Saturday’s foe, Cavs Gaming, had the league’s top-four spots tied down.

As a result, there’s a real chance the Bucks are a much better team than their record necessarily suggests at this early point in the season, and on Saturday they finally produced a performance and a result to hint at that.

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In spite of a disappointing loss at the hands of Blazer5 Gaming in Week 3, Bucks Gaming opted for consistency heading into this one. Procis1on remained on the sidelines, and positions and archetypes stayed the same for the Bucks.

While the lineup changes appeared drastic a week earlier, on this occasion it was clear Bucks Gaming had put the work in to gain an improved feel for their roles.

STL2LA continued at point guard, but displayed a much improved handle and a more confident and assertive approach generally. With only a single turnover to his name too, STL2LA was able to overcome the turnover woes that plagued him and his team against Blazer5.

Game6Drake also remained in an off-ball role where he looked close to automatic last time out. The problem on that occasion was a low number of attempts as the Bucks struggled to get him involved, but on Saturday there were no such problems as Drake frequently pulled out to the corners where his teammates willingly found him with passes.

KingPeroxide was afforded the freedom to attack off the dribble, and also take up a significant share of the playmaking responsibilities from the forward spot. Having demonstrated his effectiveness in that kind of role en route to scoring 41 points earlier in the season, Peroxide again thrived in that capacity as he continues to prove himself as the Bucks’ best go-to scoring option.

Manning the frontcourt, BigMeek and oLarry failed to offer the kind of scoring punch that both men have previously managed, but they offered a strong rebounding presence that helped Bucks Gaming to overcome some past issues. The Bucks claimed 17 boards to control the rebounding battle, and 13 of those came from the combination of Big Meek and Larry.

While the Bucks have been involved in some low-scoring games in the past, perhaps attributable to the fact they’ve always previously been involved in the first game of the gameweek, that wasn’t the case on this occasion.

Bucks Gaming got out to a 21-20 lead through the first quarter, in large part due to the assertiveness of Peroxide who looked to dominate from the early running.

That continued in the second quarter as Peroxide racked up a heady 21-point first half total to give Bucks Gaming a 40-34 half-time lead.

The Bucks continued to look good into the second half, rarely looking threatened by a Cavs Legion team who they previously defeated in the preseason Tip-Off Tournament. Still, without being able to ever really extend their lead out of reach there was plenty of cause for tension as they looked to secure a first win to take back to Milwaukee.

That became evident as the Cavs grabbed a three-point lead to carry over into the fourth quarter, but some good early defense in that period from Bucks Gaming helped them to re-seize the initiative.

With 90 seconds remaining it appeared as if the Bucks may have been able to grab a comfortable win as they led by six points, yet costly, ill-timed turnovers were their undoing as Cavs Legion tied the game up once again. A three-pointer from Drake failed to fall at the buzzer and the game was headed to three extra minutes of OT.

In spite of the potential for their heads to drop having failed to close the game out in regulation, to their credit, Bucks Gaming came out strong in the extra period and quickly re-established a lead.

Having missed a potential game-winner in the fourth, Drake was particularly impressive as he knocked down two clutch shots.

An and-one from Peroxide effectively sealed it, and the celebrations could finally begin for Bucks Gaming.

With the win, Bucks Gaming moved up to 14th in the standings, which is important as it took them out of a potential play-in game for the first mid-season tournament which takes place next week.

Next: Bucks Gaming fall to 0-3 regular season start after loss to Blazer5 Gaming

That tournament, The Turn, will see Bucks Gaming match up with the third seeded Mavs Gaming next week, although an exact schedule has yet to be released.