Jason Kidd’s Milwaukee Bucks fell just one shot short of a big upset of Gregg Popovich’s San Antonio Spurs.
LaMarcus Aldridge gave the Spurs a 97-96 lead with 21.2 seconds left when Giannis Antetokounmpo was called for a goaltending.
On the ensuing possession, the Bucks had the chance to take the lead on an open 3-pointer from Mirza Teletovic, but he was unable to capitalize.
“Our job is to now execute coming down and we execute and got a wide-open three, you know you couldn’t ask for a better shot it just didn’t go down for us tonight,” Kidd said. “Just the small things we’ve got to get better. Being able to rebound the ball there late, you know if we rebound the ball maybe the game is different.”
Jabari Parker was the leading scorer for Milwaukee, finishing the game with 23 points and eight rebounds.
Antetokounmpo added a double-double with 22 points and 11 rebounds.
Kidd’s Bucks limited to the Spurs to only nine points in the second quarter. Unfortunately, the defense fell apart in the third when they allowed San Antonio back in the game with 36 points.
“They went to the zone and that kind of slowed us down a little bit. We had a lot of good looks from behind the arc and a lot of open shots that we just didn’t knock down and we got into a little free throw game where we were in the bonus there in that third, but the other side of that was were weren’t getting stops in that third quarter so they made up ground,” Jason said. “But it came down to a possession or two, you know being able to rebound there late in the game for us or being able to not execute down the stretch being able to make a shot, unfortunately, we just didn’t have that opportunity tonight, the ball just didn’t bounce our way.”
The Spurs had every man on the roster play, with seven of eight bench players recording at least eight minutes.
“They’re good. They know how to move the ball,” Kidd said. “You look at their roster, they’ve got guys from top to bottom who play hard and Pop kept rotating, finding guys who were going to turn the momentum, and they turned it.”
Now, Jason and the Bucks look forward to another tough Western Conference test against the Portland Trail Blazers on Wednesday night.
“You can always grow from losing too and in going through the experience in going through a close game you can learn from your mistakes,” J-Kidd said. “I think tonight we can learn a lot from our mistakes.”
