The young Milwaukee Bucks just couldn’t trade shots with one of the NBA’s most physical teams, the Memphis Grizzlies, Monday night.
Riding a six-game win streak into Memphis, Jason Kidd’s crew fell behind early and never led in a 113-93 road defeat at the FedEx Forum.
“This was a man’s game. You have to be ready for the hit. They were going to be the desperate ones. We needed to be desperate and they controlled the whole game, the whole tempo of the game; we never got out and ran, we had trouble with rebounding the ball and then offensively we couldn’t get in a flow, we just over-dribbled the ball,” Jason said. “We had some great looks that normally we make but we didn’t make tonight, but overall we just weren’t ready for the fight at the beginning of the game.”
Memphis won the scoring battle in every quarter, opening the contest with a three from Mike Conley and ever really looking back. While Milwaukee was able to bring the game to single digits in the third quarter, the Grizzlies blew it back open in the fourth.
“We got back in that third quarter to get it in single digits and we just couldn’t get over the hump,” Jason said. “Some of those shots were off of 50-50 balls where we could get a block or we got a miss but we couldn’t finish the play. Before this when we were playing at a high level we were finishing plays off and getting out and running and tonight we just couldn’t do that.”
Giannis Antetokounmpo was the high scorer for Milwaukee, finishing the game with 18 points in 28 minutes. Overall it was a 3-point shooting spectacle, as both teams hit 14 threes and shot over 50 percent from behind the arc.
“I think both teams were having a three-point contest. They both shot over 50 percent,” Kidd said. “That kept us close, but we just turned the ball over or didn’t finish a play when I think we had it down to seven and we got a stop and we ended up turning the ball back over. So we fought, we just couldn’t get stops when we had to.”
The 40-year old swingman Vince Carter showed he still has something left in the tank, as Kidd’s old Dallas teammate scored 24 points and was a perfect 8-of-8 from the field and 6-of-6 from behind the arc.
“He made every shot tonight. I think he was a perfect example of understanding be ready when they were desperate, he came out as a starter and I thought he got those guys going,” J-Kidd said. “Again, they shot a lot of threes and Vince was part of that first half that he was perfect. Just the little things, we just didn’t get in a rhythm. Giannis got in foul trouble and we just walked the ball up, we never could get the pace going in our favor.
Up next the Bucks will look to start a new winning streak in Los Angeles on Wednesday night.
“This game is over,” Kidd said. “We have to look at the video tomorrow and understand some of the things that we have to clean up and then get ready for the Clippers.”
