We’re going to put an early disclaimer on how weird this week was for the Milwaukee Bucks, so let’s have some fun with handing out this round of three stars for this week.
After seeing their eight-game win streak come to an end with their loss to the Boston Celtics and going 2-2 last week, their latest performance in their loss to the New York Knicks Saturday night featured a skeleton crew with eight active players on hand.
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With that in mind, this week was memorable for the rare sight of seeing the Bucks’ prospects get playing time and collectively putting in a gutsy effort against the Knicks before falling late.
So in the name of fun, let’s hand out our three Milwaukee Bucks stars of the week and highlight on the play of their seldom-used players.
Thanasis Antetokounmpo is the Milwaukee Bucks’ first star of the week
Thanasis Antetokounmpo showed all Bucks fans what he’s capable of producing by nearly leading the Bucks to an improbable victory against the Knicks last time out.
Acting as the Bucks’ pseudo point guard, Thanasis was spearheading the Bucks’ offensive attack and made great decisions with the ball, whether expertly creating handoffs for Bucks shooters or making the right pass to teammates cutting off the ball.
More impressive was the fact that the elder Antetokounmpo was scoring the ball at a highly efficient rate en route to his career night of 23 points on 8-of-15 shooting, including going 4-for-5 from downtown. The sheer joy of seeing Antetokounmpo nail that deep stepback jumper that brought the Bucks within 2 of the Knicks with nearly 2 minutes to go in the fourth quarter was truly something else.
With such a watermark night, Antetokounmpo fully earned this first star of the week and given the full rein to operate in such a featured role suited Antetokounmpo and the Bucks well.