The Bucks Ran Away From The Banged Up Nets To Take Game 4 And Even The Series

The Milwaukee Bucks clawed their way back into their second round series with the Brooklyn Nets with a hard fought, 86-83 win in Game 3 to make it a 2-1 series deficit with a chance to even things up with another home game in Game 4. After Milwaukee jumped on Brooklyn early in Game 3, taking a 30-9 lead and then holding on the rest of the way, it was the Nets who jumped out early to a 9-2 advantage in Game 4 thanks to some tremendous shot-making from Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving.

The Bucks would settle in from there, though, and the hyper-competitive series we had expected from the beginning seemed to be taking shape, as the two teams traded runs — first a 13-0 from Brooklyn followed by a 12-0 from Milwaukee — to trade leads in the first half.

However, Game 4 shifted dramatically in the second quarter, though, when Kyrie landed on Giannis’ foot in the paint and suffered a sprained right ankle, forcing him out for the remainder of the game and leaving his longterm status in question.

The Nets were able to hold on to keep the deficit to three at the half, but it was clear it would take a Herculean effort from Kevin Durant to keep their offense running at a level to keep pace with the Bucks in the second half.

In the third quarter, the Bucks started to assert their will as the Nets struggled to score without Irving, pulling ahead by as many as 16 on a couple of occasions. Brooklyn clawed their way back late thanks to a run sparked by KD, who found his way to the free throw line to get in rhythm and then made some incredibly tough shots, including this scramble drill baseline jumper to cut the lead to nine with just six seconds to play in the quarter.

That suddenly made things seem like they would be very interesting going into the fourth, but Khris Middleton ensured Milwaukee entered the final frame with a double-digit lead, hitting a ridiculous three over what seemed like the entire Nets team at the buzzer.

The two teams traded shots early in the fourth, but the Bucks started to pull away again as Brooklyn simply struggled to keep up on the offensive end. Milwaukee took as much as a 19-point lead after threes from Khris Middleton and then Jrue Holiday with six minutes to play, and it seemed as though it might be curtains on the Nets in Game 4.

To Brooklyn’s credit, they continued battling, but weren’t able to get the led any closer than 13 with just over five minutes to play before Steve Nash pulled the plug on the starters and inserted a five-man bench unit with 4:28 to play and Brooklyn trailing 99-84. The Bucks left their starting unit out there for another minute and Giannis put an exclamation point on the victory with a vicious block on one end followed by a thunderous alley-oop dunk on the other to give him 34 points and 12 rebounds on an afternoon where he was a +29 in his 38 minutes of action.

Milwaukee would then empty its bench with just over three minutes to play, eventually cruising to a 107-96 win to even the series at two games apiece going back to Brooklyn. Given where the series was when they left Barclays Center last week, things have shifted dramatically to where, given Irving and Harden’s injuries, the Bucks will likely find themselves as the betting favorites to win the series. The Nets certainly still have a chance, as does any team that can deploy Kevin Durant, but so much of what happens the rest of the way in this series will be determined by the injuries to their two star guards.

Harden has been able to do some on-court work, but Steve Nash indicated before Game 4 that he still has a number of hurdles yet to clear in his rehab before he would be able to play in a game. Irving, meanwhile, will surely undergo further testing and an MRI to determine the extent of his ankle sprain, but given the pain he was in leaving Game 4, it would be fairly stunning if he was a go for Game 5 back in Brooklyn.