Not much needs to be said about the Milwaukee Bucks' defeat to the Brooklyn Nets. Outclassed and outworked on both ends of the floor.
Last season's issues seem to be continuing over despite a number of changes to the roster. The opening night victory over the short-handed Philadelphia 76ers showed glimpses of what the Bucks can be, and it looked like the league would have a problem. Fast forward to Monday, and back-to-back defeats to the young Chicago Bulls and Brooklyn Nets show that there is a lot this Bucks team needs to work on.
Now, we are only three games into the season, so there will always be things to iron out, but some of the concerns surrounding the Milwaukee Bucks will be huge problems if they want to achieve their goal of winning another NBA title.
Here are three of the biggest concerns and how the Milwaukee Bucks can fix them.
1. Rebounding
Rebounding has been a problem early on for the Milwaukee Bucks, and more specifically, preventing offensive rebounds. Despite sitting 14th in the league in total rebounds, the Bucks are 27th in offensive rebounds. Then, looking at the opponent's numbers, the Milwaukee Bucks allow the 10th most rebounds to a team with 47.3.
In the opening game against the Sixers, they lost the rebound battle 49 to 46, which is nothing drastic until you look closer and see they gave up 17 offensive rebounds. Against the Bulls, it was 47-46 in the Bucks' favor, and they did better by allowing just nine offensive rebounds on that occasion. Then, the Nets beat them 47-43 on the glass and registered 12 offensive boards.
With Giannis Antetokounmpo, Brook Lopez and Bobby Portis all being available, the Milwaukee Bucks need to stop their opponents from grabbing offensive boards and creating second-chance opportunities. They allowed the Nets to score 21 second-chance points.
To make that worse, the Milwaukee Bucks only had seven second-chance points, so it is a clear hole in their game that allows teams to run away with leads. The Nets are expected to be one of the weaker teams this season, and they comfortably beat Milwaukee.
There are two ways Doc Rivers can fix this. The first would be changing up the rotation and allowing the younger guys with more athleticism to play and letting them use their physical assets to crash the boards. The second option is a simple one that requires players to buy in and be more aggressive, crashing the glass on both ends of the floor. That way, the number of offensive rebounds given up will decrease somewhat.
It has been a worrying sign for a Milwaukee Bucks team that has been so good at rebounding in recent years, and they have the players available to alter this issue.