Milwaukee Bucks Historically Bad Shooting Leads to Loss
The Milwaukee Bucks title defense season came to an end Sunday afternoon in a blowout Game 7 loss to the Boston Celtics—81-109. The loss was a result of a combination of a poor defensive scheme, fatigue, and most importantly, historically disastrous 3-point shooting.
The box score is painful to look at to say the least. The discrepancy between the Milwaukee Bucks and Celtics in 3-point shooting is staggering.
The Celtics shot 22/55 from 3, a 40% clip. Grant Williams made seven 3-pointers, making him the third player ever to make seven 3s in a Game 7. The Celtics 22 made 3s is the most ever in a game 7 and the most in a game in playoff Celtics history.
On the Bucks side, the theme of poor playoff shooting continued in Game 7. The Bucks shot a woeful 4/33 from 3—a 12% clip. Notably, the Bucks rotation of guards (Holiday, Matthews, Allen, Connaughton) shot a combined 0/18 from 3.
The 12.1% 3-point percentage is the worst the Bucks have had in any game, regular season or playoffs, in the past six seasons. In games in which the Milwaukee Bucks have shot at least 25 3s, it is their worst shooting game in franchise history. As a team that shot 30+ attempts, it is the second worst 3-point shooting game in NBA playoff history.
In total across the 7 game series , the Bucks were outscored 327-171 from deep. Needless to say, that is a tough number to overcome. However, this does continue a worrying trend of poor playoff shooting.
This is the second consecutive playoffs that the Bucks have shot below 33% from 3. This playoffs, the Bucks shot 32.7% from 3, which ranked 11th out of the 16 playoff teams. In fact, in each of the last four playoffs, the Bucks have not been in the top half of teams in playoff 3-point percentage.
It is hard to see a clear answer to some of the playoff shooting woes. The Bucks have capable shooters, yet it seems every playoffs they shoot far below what they are capable of—the Bucks ranked in the top 5 in regular season 3pt% the past two seasons.
It will be a task of Jon Horst and the Milwaukee Bucks front office this offseason to find talent that can shoot well and spread out the offense in the playoffs going forward.