Milwaukee Bucks: 3 things we learned in Miami and rout over Chicago Bulls
Continuing their uneven start into the new year, we look at the impressions we learned from the Milwaukee Bucks’ second week of the season.
As the Milwaukee Bucks are looking to care of business at home this week, they’ve yet to find the consistency they were looking for to start their 2020-21 season.
Standing at 3-3, we’ve seen pretty significant peaks and valleys in their play, all of which has started from the top as Bucks superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo looks to find his form and dfend his MVP title.
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Their back-to-back set against the Miami Heat and their first meeting versus their I-94 rival, the Chicago Bulls, from last week certainly encapsulated the Jekyll and Hyde nature to the Bucks’ start.
Through those trio of games, though, we learned more about where the Bucks stand early on in their run and what they could look like when everything comes together as the season progresses.
Just as we did following the Milwaukee Bucks’ opening week of the 2020-21 season, let’s dive into what stood out in the Bucks’ trip down to South Beach and their 30-point blowout victory over the Chicago Bulls.
The Milwaukee Bucks’ 3-point evolution
Under head coach Mike Budenholzer, the Bucks have known how to let it fly. But the last two seasons of lunching up 3-point looks at middling efficiency showed the limits of the Bucks’ pace and space attack.
After making shooting and general shotmaking a top priority over the offseason as Bucks general manager Jon Horst recently explained in an interview with The Athletic ($$), the Bucks have shown the full breadth to their shooting firepower.
It’s not just that the Bucks are leading the league in both total 3-point makes (108) and 3-point percentage (43.9 percent) over what is surely a small sample size. They have three games in which they have hit 20 or more 3-pointers, including a NBA record-breaking 29 triples in their 144-97 win over the Heat and going 22-for 45 from deep against Chicago on Friday night.
Over Budenholzer’s first two seasons in Milwaukee, the Bucks had four outings in which they hit 20 or more 3-pointers.
Is this just a hot start that has emerged as one of the strongest early season trends from the Bucks? It’s too early to tell, but it’s clear the additions and internal improvement the Bucks are seeing from behind the 3-point line has supercharged their offense to start the year that tops the league in offensive rating, per NBA.com/stats.