Milwaukee Bucks: Roundtable ahead of Toronto Raptors Conference Finals series
By Adam McGee
Should the Bucks return to their regular season, dropping defense, continue to switch, or opt for a hybrid of the two?
RC: I wager the Bucks defense will mostly return to normal against the Raptors. Lowry can’t score in the mid-range as well as Irving could, and the pick-and-pop with Gasol isn’t as scary as it was with Horford. Leonard runs the Raptors’ offense and is a force, but he isn’t the passer that Irving is so I don’t think the Bucks are as afraid of him attacking their defense with screens.
DL: Milwaukee will need to continue to do both in this series, though a return to their original approach will be much more feasible against Toronto.
If the Raptors play significant minutes with Marc Gasol and Serge Ibaka on the floor at the same time, Milwaukee can get away with playing the defensive scheme that made them successful for so much of the season. Ibaka and Gasol aren’t nearly as efficient at spot-up shots as Al Horford was, so the threat they pose on those looks isn’t the same.
Where the Bucks could run into trouble using their regular season scheme, however, is if Toronto goes small. The Raptors could use a small-ball lineup where Siakam and Leonard are their front court. In that case, switching may become necessary, especially since both were dangers from distance as evidenced by their percentages from three during the regular season.
Some combination of both will probably be the best course. Which they lean toward will ultimately depend on who Toronto is rolling out there at specific points during the game.
DB: If I argue that the Bucks need to stop the supporting cast from getting going, then I would have to argue that the Bucks will need to combine the two defensive styles in order to prevent the Raptors’ sidekicks from scoring. Although I do not need to say it, Lowry and Gasol do not scare me nearly as much as Irving and Horford did last series, but if those two fail to get going then the Bucks will have a great chance of advancing to the Finals. If the Bucks can prevent Gasol and Lowry from getting off to a hot start from three, the rest of the focus can be applied to the Raptors’ second best player, Pascal Siakam.
RK: I expect the Bucks to start out the series with their normal drop coverage. Not only is it the scheme that the players are used to, but the Raptors do not have the personnel to exploit it like the Celtics did. However, if the game does get close or the Bucks feel overwhelmed, I believe Budenholzer will move to a switch-heavy scheme. The players and coaches now know how deadly it can be even in the playoffs, and will surely go to it if needed.
SR: I think this depends on which Raptors player(s) is really hurting the Bucks, if any. If Marc Gasol and Serge Ibaka are pick and popping the Bucks to death as Brook Lopez sinks into the lane and is late to recover, then perhaps it’ll make more sense to move to their switching scheme a little bit more. If, however, the normal drop coverage scheme is seeing the Raptors take long twos and floaters, then you stick with that even if they are hitting them at a decent rate.
We’ve seen so many games where the Bucks will gladly give up the pull-up 16-footer, or the floater that has to “float” above the outstretched arms of Brook Lopez. The Bucks can live with allowing those shots all day long, while putting up 45 three-point attempts on the offensive end, and Bucks fans can sit back and watch simple mathematics lead to beautiful things.
LW: The Bucks had success in their drop scheme against Toronto in the regular season, so I expect to see it early and often. However, Marc Gasol changes that some, and the Raptors will have a full series to make adjustments. Additionally, the Bucks have looked so dominant when they go smaller and switch everything that it seems unlikely that scheme will not stick around for this series as well. In short, Milwaukee will likely mix their drop and switching schemes often.
BR: I don’t think it’s crazy to think the Bucks will deploy a bit of both. Marc Gasol is not as willing to “Let It Fly” as Al Horford is, and while Serge Ibaka has not hesitated to pull the trigger against Milwaukee in the regular season, him chucking them up from beyond the arc might not be the worst thing for the Bucks in a seven game series, even if he gets hot for a game or two. I think Coach Bud may experiment with what works the best against certain opposing lineups, since the Bucks have the versatility to roll out either scheme in pretty much any lineup they deploy.
JT: As superior as the Raptors are compared to the Bucks’ previous opponent last round in the Boston Celtics, Toronto doesn’t possess the kind of willing shooters that the Celtics had, which forced the Bucks to veer off their traditional defensive scheme to begin with.
From that standpoint, I think we’ll see the Bucks revert back to the formula that disrupted the Raptors’ offense in their season series, save for the lone win they had this season. That isn’t to say we won’t see them go back to switching mostly everything for stretches throughout the series, but I don’t think the Raptors force the same kind of issues and concerns for the Bucks defensively as Boston theoretically did.