3 keys for Milwaukee Bucks Christmas matchup against Boston Celtics

Merry Christmas, Milwaukee Bucks fans! For the fourth straight season, the Bucks are in action on Christmas Day and are playing at home for the second consecutive year. Milwaukee is 4-3 all-time on Christmas Day after winning a blowout against the Golden State Warriors last season.

This time around, it’s against the Boston Celtics.

The Celtics have given the Bucks a relative amount of trouble this season, winning both of their previous matchups. Granted, the Bucks were incredibly shorthanded in their first meeting without Giannis Antetokounmpo and Khris Middleton, among others. Their second game was also the second night of a back-to-back and Middleton exited early with a knee injury, but he wasn’t playing well to that point and neither was the Bucks.

It will be the first home game of the season against the Celtics and there could be reinforcements on the way for the Bucks, who are battling through health and safety protocols (as almost every other team is).

Will Giannis Antetokounmpo be available for the Milwaukee Bucks?

The reigning Finals MVP entered health and safety protocols on December 14th and, according to league rules, a vaccinated player who tests positive for COVID must spend 10 days away from the team but can return in fewer than 10 days if they return two negative PCR tests.

December 25th, obviously, would be 11 days after he entered health and safety protocols, so he would certainly be eligible to return for tonight’s game against the Celtics, but will the Bucks allow him to play now that he’s cleared protocols?

We saw earlier this year with Middleton’s positive test for COVID-19 that the Bucks held him out initially, even when he cleared the protocols to build up his conditioning upon his return. It remains to be seen whether or not they’ll do the same with Antetokounmpo, but there’s no guarantee he’s available tonight.

This would mark the second time in three meetings against the Celtics that Antetokounmpo didn’t play and the Bucks, despite strong performances in their recent back-to-back set without him, will be hard-pressed to get their first win of the season against the Celtics.