The NBA Playoffs frequently come down to the best star talent — even if we’re talking just one player — in each series, and it’s showing in the Bucks-Celtics second-round series.
Milwaukee took down Boston 113-101 in Game 4 on Monday night at TD Garden, to take a 3-1 lead in the series. That’s after the Celtics took Game 1.
And the difference in the game, as well as the difference in the series, is that the Bucks have Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Celtics don’t.
The Greek Freak went off for 39 points on an extremely efficient 15-of-22 shooting from the field (also went 7-of-10 at the line), and pulled down 16 boards. Antetokounmpo was particularly fantastic in the fourth quarter, when he scored 17 of his 39 points. No other Bucks player even scored over 15 points.
🦌 @Giannis_An34 goes off for 39 PTS, 16 REB, 4 AST in the @Bucks Game 4 victory!
The last @Bucks player to record 35+ PTS, 15+ REB and 4+ AST in an #NBAPlayoffs game was @kaj33 (4/30/74 vs. BOS – 36 PTS, 15 REB, 6 AST). pic.twitter.com/8iyZwkEgxl
— NBA.com/Stats (@nbastats) May 7, 2019
This spin move and dunk served as an appropriate dagger:
GIANNIS EXCLAMATION POINT‼️#FearTheDeer | #NBAPlayoffs pic.twitter.com/QyVjEQcBfZ
— NBA on TNT (@NBAonTNT) May 7, 2019
What makes things even more difficult for the Celtics is that they’d need to win twice in Milwaukee to make this series comeback. With the basically unstoppable Antetokounmpo on the other side, winning all three of these games seems like an incredibly difficult task for Boston. Five Thirty-Eight gives that just a 4% chance of happening.
