The Milwaukee Bucks were in Detroit Monday night taking on their division foe Detroit Pistons. The Bucks rode a crazy first quarter, in which they scored their high in any quarter this season with 49 points, to the win. Also, the first half was the Bucks’ highest-scoring half this season with 83 points.
One important note before I dive into takeaways, Bobby Portis left this game shortly before all the starters came out with a right leg injury. Portis had his heel landed on which twisted his ankle and caused some pain to his knee, after the game he said “I’ll be alright”.
With the comfort of knowing Bobby Portis wasn’t seriously injured in a game the Milwaukee Bucks got two other massive pieces back in the lineup, let’s look at takeaways from the Bucks’ win over the Pistons.
Takeaways from Milwaukee Bucks win over Detroit Pistons: Giannis Antetokounmpo and Khris Middleton are back
Giannis Antetokounmpo returned to the Milwaukee Bucks lineup and from the tip looked like he hadn’t missed a game. Giannis if anything, looked like he benefitted heavily from sitting out the last five games and came out firing on all cylinders. Giannis was really firing on the orange cylinder in front of the Pistons bench, Giannis started the first quarter 6-for-6 from the field, including two 3-point makes and dropped 20 of his 29 points in the first frame. Giannis’ energy and scoring outburst set the tone for a blowout win and the most points the Detroit Pistons have allowed since 1988.
Giannis as stated finished with 29 points on 8-of-15 shooting, adding 12 rebounds and four assists, all in just 26 minutes of play.
Head coach Mike Budenholzer said before the game that no players were on minutes restrictions although it did feel that way for Khris Middleton. Middleton returned to the lineup but did not resume his position in the starting lineup. Khris came off the bench and played 15 minutes and looked pretty good for a guy playing his first game in five weeks and only the eighth game of the entire season.
Khris Middleton looked like his usual self, probing the defense looking for his shot and handing out assists to anyone who would take them. Passing remains one of the biggest underrated aspects of Middleton’s game. In his 15 minutes of play he registered four assists that could have been several more. Middleton scored eight points in his return on 3-of-7 shooting including 2-of-4 behind the 3-point line.
Khris Middleton did have six turnovers, one coming on his first touch of the game, acquainting him with the NBA’s new emphasis on traveling violations before starting to move off the dribble, also one coming for stepping out of bounds after securing an offensive rebound. All things considered, decent return to action for Khris in an albeit small sample size, hopefully his minutes are expanded Wednesday against the Denver Nuggets.