The Milwaukee Bucks put together a tremendous offensive performance Wednesday night, but defense didn’t follow for Jason Kidd’s squad against the Sacramento Kings.
The Bucks sprayed 13 three-pointers and registered their highest scoring total of the season, but they struggled on the defensive end in a 129-118 defeat. Jason said afterward that his team fell right into Sacramento’s trap and tried to match pace with the fast-paced Kings.
“I think that you can fall in love with trying to score the ball, which they do. But, if you don’t play any defense, there’s going to be a time where you don’t score the ball,” J-Kidd told the media. “And, that was for us, we had a period there where we were shooting jump shots, and if you’re going to go jump shot to jump shot against them, you’re going to lose and that’s what happened tonight.”
The Bucks have been inconsistent defensively, but in their last game out, they put together a tremendous effort on that end in a 109-88 victory over the Detroit Pistons. After watching an excellent defensive performance against the Pistons, J-Kidd was hoping his team could build some momentum on the defensive end of the floor, but it didn’t happen.
“I think we are all disappointed that we didn’t compete on the defensive end after we just had one of our best defensive games against Detroit,” Coach Kidd told reporters.
Jason noted that the youth of the team is the main reason for their defensive struggles. He wants his players to be able to read situations and understand what their opponent is trying to do on offense and neutralize it. As he has said in previous press conferences, Jason knows this won’t happen in 10 or 20 games. It is a process that his young unit has to grind through.
“I think our age is the biggest problem. Not understanding what’s going to take place. Not being able to read what’s going to happen. And, for those young guys they’ve got to go through it. Jabari
[Parker] is a rookie. We talk about the games that he played last year, and he’s got to get these schemes down, he’s got to be seeing what’s taking place. And not just Jabari, that’s just an example, but everybody has to understand what’s happening, what they are trying to do,” Coach Kidd told reporters. “I thought we started the game off the way that we finished it. And that was, Giannis [Antetokounmpo] starts the game off with a three and also doesn’t shoot the gap on [Rudy] Gay, and Gay anytime he feels that you’re going to let him do what he wants, he’s going to take advantage of that. He did that tonight.”
Forward Khris Middleton and Antetokounmpo led the Bucks with 21 points apiece. Forward John Henson had 15 and point guard Jerryd Bayless added 13 points. However, Milwaukee allowed Gay to go off, scoring 36 points. Small forward Omri Cassipi (19), point guard Darren Collison (18), shooting guard Marco Belinelli (17) and center Kosta Koufous (14) all hit double figures for the Kings as well.
Greg Monroe and Henson led the way early while Sacramento was without DeMarcus Cousins down low. They each had 10 before halftime, and the Bucks trailed 69-66 at the break. After three quarters, the two squads had already scored enough for an entire game, but behind 61 percent shooting, the Kings led 96-92.
Milwaukee scored the first five points of the fourth quarter, but without stout defensive play, Jason’s squad could never completely close the gap.
In the closing minutes, Coach Kidd had seen enough. Frustrated by the rough defensive game and the lack of calls going the way of his players, he earned a technical foul and was ejected from the contest. Jason explained what happened to the media in the postgame.
“One, I called a timeout. I walked all the way down to get a timeout. Zach asked me what I wanted, I said I need a timeout. And then, we had our discussion, he gave me the T, and so from there I’m trying one, to protect my guys, understanding that we felt that we were getting fouled and the whistle wasn’t being blown,” Coach Kidd told reporters. “What happens in this league, you have to stand up for yourself and my job is to protect those young guys as much as we thought we were getting fouled. But, that wasn’t the issue of the game. We gave them warm-up jump shots. They got our temperature, saw that we didn’t want to play defense and they took advantage of it and that’s as easy as it is.”
