Milwaukee Bucks: 3 things to watch in rematch with New York Knicks

After taking eventually care of business against the very undermanned Philadelphia 76ers, the Milwaukee Bucks are right back in action tonight against the New York Knicks. They have a chance to get back to 0.500, though they’ll be in tough on the second half of a back-to-back against a very good Knicks team.

This will be the second meeting between the two teams after the Bucks blew a big first-quarter lead to the Knicks on Friday last week. Sure, Jrue Holiday was on a minutes limit, but they’ll also be tired after a game that came down to the final minutes against the Sixers that had a bit of an Ewing theory vibe to it.

That being said, the Bucks are slowly finding their rhythm with their shooting as multiple role players broke out of some collective slumps last night. They’ll need all hands on deck for this quick turnaround against a team that plays very aggressive, stifling, and relentless defense.

How cautious will the Milwaukee Bucks be resting players against the New York Knicks?

It has been interesting to see how the Bucks have handled resting players while knowing they need the bodies to remain competitive and take some of the load off of Giannis Antetokounmpo. Speaking of Giannis, he would typically be a candidate to rest either last night or tonight, especially knowing he is still dealing with knee soreness.

At the same time, the Bucks need to be cautious to not be too cautious and dig themselves in too deep of a hole early and they won’t be able to rest guys later in the season. We’ve seen them play it safe with players returning from injury (Semi Ojeleye and Bobby Portis in particular).

The Bucks played a rather tight rotation in the second half of their game against the Sixers, with Antetokounmpo and Portis each playing over 35 minutes. What that also means is that players like Jordan Nwora (who played around 15 minutes) and Rodney Hood or Thanasis Antetokounmpo (who were each DNP-CDs) will be relatively fresh.

Rest has been a big theme of the Bucks the last few seasons and was supposed to be another one this season if not for a slew of injuries and illnesses to begin the season.

It will be interesting to see how head coach Mike Budenholzer handles the rotation in this one as he tries to balance load management this early in the season while also wanting to remain competitive and keep up with one of the East’s better teams.