Milwaukee Bucks: 3 reasons why not worry about Jrue Holiday’s series against Nets

Jrue Holiday has made his presence known defensively to the Milwaukee Bucks

There’s no secret and there’s no denying it, Holiday is an elite NBA defender and that’s certainly been as advertised throughout his first season in Milwaukee.

Now coming off his third All-Defensive selection of his career and second first team selection, Holiday has been immense on that side of the ball as he’s guarded the likes of Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving for extensive minutes this series. While there is no stopping these two players for the Nets, Holiday has done a great job of making them work harder to score and forcing them into difficult shots that they can still make.

Per NBA.com/stats, Irving has scored 22 points on 8-for-21 shooting (4-for-10 from three, 2-for-2 from the free throw line) across the 103 partial possessions Holiday has been matched up on him for the series. Meanwhile, Durant has scored 13 points on 5-for-9 shooting (1-for-2 from long range, 2-for-2 from the free throw line) across 24.3 partial possessions.

It doesn’t always show up in the box score, Holiday’s work and tenacity on the defensive end wil play a part in the Bucks swinging this series their way even it continues down the path it’s on. Now with Irving out for likely the rest of the series and Harden giving it a go for Game 5, Holiday will be needed in order for the Bucks to stall out the Nets’ high-powered offense.