On April 23, Beijing time, in this season's playoffs, the Bucks lacked the core main force, but the Bucks defeated the Bulls at home by 30 points, allowing the opponent to swallow the humiliating defeat. When the Bucks lost Middleton, a lot of words about "dark horses" came into view. However, how did the Bucks manage to win after losing their main players?
In this game, the Bucks were naturally not affected by Middleton's injury, they instead won a big win, before this game, Bucks coach Budenholzer did not mention who replaced Middleton to start, as soon as they came up, the Bucks put up a "three highs" and turned Portis, who was also on the lottery in the previous game, to start first. At the same time, the bucks even posed an iron barrel array.
This is because in the regular season this season, although the Bulls' three-point shooting rate is high in the league, the average number of shots per game is at the bottom of the league, and the average number of shots per game is also the second to last, which can be regarded as the weakest team in the league. As a result, the Bulls are good at playing inside offense, and the Bucks' tactics work.
Because the Bulls are good at attacking inside this season, they are averaging 19th in the league per game, but they are 10th in the league in three seconds. In addition, in the 10 meters under the basket to the three-point line area, the Bulls' shooting percentage is also in the league's top three, which mainly comes from DeRozan.
And what if this area is locked up? Especially against DeRozan, who scored 41 points in the last game, what if the Bucks stepped up their defense?
The answer is self-evident, and the penalty area guarded by alphabet brothers, Portis and Brooke-Lopez's "three highs" is arguably the league's most entrenched interior line. After Middleton's absence, the Bucks resolutely used the bag clip against DeRozan, which made DeRozan very uncomfortable in this game.
As a result, DeRozan failed to continue the excellent form of the previous game, he played 32 minutes (did not play in the fourth quarter), shot 4 of 9, did not shoot three-pointers, 3 of 5 from the free throw line, only had 11 points, 5 rebounds, 4 assists and 1 steal, 3 turnovers, plus-minus -23 lowest in the game.
Of course, in addition to DeRozan, Lavin and Coby White combined to score just 21 points on 8-of-22 shots. Therefore, after locking up DeRozan, the Bucks' defense on the inside also made other players very uncomfortable, and in the end, they also made the opponent unable to score, and finally won the opponent with a crazy score of 111-81.
I have to say that Bucks coach Budenholzer's deployment in this game will really be textbook level!