Milwaukee Bucks: Takeaways from 124-103 scrimmage loss to New Orleans Pelicans

Milwaukee Bucks: Takeaways from scrimmage loss to New Orleans Pelicans – The defense rests

There’s no question that the Bucks’ identity lies on the defensive end, but they struggled to play to the ideals and tenets they have lived by for the last two years on Monday night.

New Orleans’ shooting struggles throughout the first half did help keep them at bay as the Bucks eventually sank into their own poor shooting as the night went along. But the Bucks’ defending slipped considerably over the course of the second half and especially throughout the Pelicans’ 40-point third quarter.

As previously mentioned, Redick’s 20-point outburst was the main culprit as a number of Bucks players had the unenviable task of chasing the sharpshooter around screens that led to easy buckets.

But what was more inexcusable and certainly caught the attention of Bucks head coach Mike Budenholzer was the number of ticky-tacky shooting fouls the Bucks committed on that end of the floor, some going to Redick as well. While the whole night was dictated by the whistles of the night’s officials, as evidenced by the 67 combined free throw attempts from both teams, Milwaukee’s fundamental defending was off track, to say the least.

Of course, the Bucks were without some major rotation pieces for the night, but that’s one area that will hopefully be cleaned up by the time the ball gets to bouncing Friday night against Boston.