Bucks: “Belief” that Giannis Antetokounmpo Could Play Game 7 if Needed

Us Milwaukee Bucks fans have come a long way since Tuesday night. The injury that Giannis Antetokounmpo sustained looked like it was not only season-ending but an injury that could potentially lead to him missing a large portion of the 2021-2022 season as well. On top of that, with Milwaukee losing by double-digits in Atlanta that same night, the thought of moving on to the Finals and still having a chance to win felt like a nearly impossible task without Antetokounmpo.

But, oh, how quickly things can change. On Wednesday, we received some excellent news that somehow, there was no ligament damage sustained when Giannis hyperextended his knee. Then on Thursday, the Giannis-less Bucks led by Jure Holiday, Khris Middleton, Brook Lopez, and Bobby Portis cruised to an 11 point win to give Milwaukee a 3-2 series lead with the opportunity to go to the NBA Finals on Saturday.

Once again, Giannis is listed as doubtful — which is still incredible, by the way, given his injury — so the Bucks will have to win Game 6 without him–and hopefully, they do. However, if this series does go to game seven, according to Chris Haynes of Yahoo! Sports, there is a “belief” that Antetkounmpo could return.

"“There’s belief Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo (knee) would be given the green light for a potential Game 7 if Hawks avoid elimination in Game 6 on Saturday, league sources tell @YahooSports.”"

While it wasn’t my expectation that Giannis was going to return for these playoffs, as I recently wrote, I didn’t want to quite rule out the idea of it either. The fact that his ligaments were still “sound” will hopefully mitigate any further injury, and perhaps I was just grasping at straws at the time, but I thought it was telling that the Bucks designated Antetokounmpo “doubtful” for Game 5 instead of “out.”

Of course, regardless of whether a player is 100 percent healthy or not, there is always the risk of re-injury or suffering a new injury–it’s just the nature of sports. But if Giannis is on the court for a possible Game 7 — or at any time for that matter — I’ll trust that the medical staff believes that the odds of further damaging the knee are relatively low. As big of a moment as these Eastern Conference Finals are, you don’t want to put the long-term health of Giannis’ knee at risk.

With all of that said, hopefully, we don’t have to worry about a Game 7, and the Bucks are able to close out the series in Atlanta on Saturday. We know that once again, it’ll take some superb performances from Middleton and Holiday, and they’ll also need another player or two to step up as well, just as Lopez and Portis did previously.

Antetokounmpo has been on a historic run during this postseason, averaging 28.2 points per game along with 5.2 assists, 0.9 blocks, 0.9 steals, and 12.7 rebounds. He is also now just one of four players, joined by Shaquille O’Neal, Hakeem Olajuwon, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, to record 10 or more games of 30 points and 10 rebounds in a single postseason since 1963.