3 keys for the small-ball Milwaukee Bucks against Cleveland Cavaliers
After one game on the road, the Milwaukee Bucks are back home for the second night of a back-to-back against the Cleveland Cavaliers. As if things were hard enough for the Bucks down many players due to health and safety protocols as well as injuries, they’ll be playing one of the hottest teams in the NBA on short rest! How fun!
The Cavs have won nine of their last 11 games and in that stretch, boast the league’s best net rating at plus-14.5 with the sixth-ranked offense and the second-best defense over that span. They’ve found a rhythm with their supersized lineup and are pummeling teams on the way to a top-four seed in the Eastern Conference.
The Bucks have beaten the Cavs once already this season, but in that game, Cleveland was on the second night of a back-to-back and Milwaukee also had its best player in that game (as well as Bobby Portis).
This is a tough matchup for the small-ball Bucks, but they’ll be at home and potentially have two of its big three available so anything could happen!
The Milwaukee Bucks are going to have a lot of trouble with the Cleveland Cavaliers’ size
If you thought the Bucks had a hard time dealing with New Orleans Pelicans big man Jonas Valanciunas (24 points, 11/15 shooting), then you won’t like what the Cavaliers’ frontcourt is going to do.
The Cavs start three players 6’11” or taller in Jarrett Allen, Evan Mobley, and Lauri Markkanen. Per NBA.com/stats, that trio is plus-10.2 in over 320 minutes together with a defensive rating of 97.2, so things won’t be easy whatsoever.
Offensively, that trio will likely dominate the glass on misses and grab extra possessions. Especially on the second night of a back-to-back after an overtime game, the Bucks will be in tough against the supersized Cavs.
Milwaukee’s two lone big men (DeMarcus Cousins and Sandro Mamukelashvili) each played fewer than 20 minutes last night, so you can expect a ton of small-ball from the Bucks in this one. Getting buckets at the rim will be extremely hard to come by with Allen and Mobley patroling inside, so unless the Bucks can get hot from behind the arc, things could get rough.
I don’t want to sound too negative, but it’s hard to envision this going any way other than poorly for the (shorthanded) defending champs.