Antetokounmpo-Lillard combo finding its groove as ‘vibes… are high’ after Bucks top Pacers

MILWAUKEE — Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard have now played 77 games together with the Milwaukee Bucks. Per Synergy, Antetokounmpo has assisted on 53 of Lillard’s 3-point makes during that time.

Few, if any, have ever excited Antetokounmpo more than the one Lillard hit with 7:27 remaining in the Bucks’ 129-117 NBA Cup win over the Indiana Pacers on Friday night.

Antetokounmpo recorded his 47th career regular-season triple-double with 37 points, 10 rebounds and 11 assists in Friday’s win, but that was not the assist that sealed it. Lillard put up 24 points, five rebounds and 13 assists, but that 3 did not set some sort of record. Antetokounmpo didn’t throw a no-look, behind-the-back pass, and Lillard didn’t win the game with that shot. In fact, immediately following the shot, the Bucks gave up an inexcusable transition dunk to Pacers center Myles Turner.

So, why was Antetokounmpo so excited about a relatively nondescript 3 sandwiched in between easy points for the Pacers in the middle of the fourth quarter?

“I don’t care that the ball went in,” Antetokounmpo said. “I called it.”

From the early days of Antetokounmpo’s heliocentric superstardom with Matthew Dellavedova bravely standing on the train tracks in front of lumbering big men to the tried-and-true flips and slips of Pat Connaughton, the inverted pick-and-roll — an action with a point guard (or smaller player) setting the screen for a forward or big man — has been a staple of the Bucks offense with Antetokounmpo running the show.

With Lillard on the squad, though, the Bucks haven’t often turned to that action with their star point guard serving as the screener. But on Friday, Lillard saw what was going to happen ahead of time and told Antetokounmpo how to put it into action.

“He said take the ball, and I’m going to slip,” Antetokounmpo recalled. “If you got the drive, take it. If not, I’m going to be wide-open. So, he’s understanding how can he use me to create an advantage for his game, so I love that.

“That’s how you build chemistry. There’s going to be a lot more.”

Leveraging Lillard’s 3-point shooting as the screener in a pick-and-roll for Antetokounmpo may seem simple, but if the last season in Milwaukee has taught us anything, it is that what might seem simple on paper is more difficult than anyone might be able to predict. Chemistry cannot be built overnight, and understanding tendencies takes repetition. The Bucks seem to be getting to that point.

And, if Friday is any indication, the Bucks are getting closer to the tipping point where those things might take hold.

GIVE ME UP HIGH TO GIANNIS! pic.twitter.com/yit2ZvRA8N

— Milwaukee Bucks (@Bucks) November 23, 2024

Against the Pacers, five of Lillard’s 13 assists went to Antetokounmpo. And, conversely, Antetokounmpo assisted on all three of Lillard’s 3-pointers for the evening.

“I think (we’re) just kind of honestly are getting to the point where we’re tuning everybody else out,” Lillard explained. “It’s just a lot of communication between the two of us, you know?

“It has nothing to do with people saying, ‘Oh, y’all need to do this or let’s try that.’ It’s like he sees what he sees. I see what I see. And we gotta use each other in that way, and I think it’s just leading to more times where when I’m having it, we’re putting people in position to where I’m throwing the ball to him.”

As Lillard’s vision is becoming more focused on Antetokounmpo, the two-time MVP forward believes their chemistry together is beginning to flourish because he has now seen enough of Lillard to understand what will happen when he’s working with his fellow All-NBA teammate.

“It’s just time. It’s time,” Antetokounmpo said. “I know. I can tell. I can tell from the rhythm. I can tell from his dribble. I can tell when he’s trying to attack. I know when he wants the ball now. I know when he’s going to reject it.

“It’s just spending time together. I’ve done this with Khris. I’ve done this with a lot of players, here with Brook. Like, it’s just reps, extra reps and those count. And right now, our two-man game, our chemistry is getting better and better and better.“

The chemistry between Antetokounmpo and Lillard will always be of the utmost importance for the Bucks as they try to claw their way back into the playoff picture. As they hold out hope of finding a new championship model with their pair from the NBA’s 75th Anniversary Team, Friday night’s win over the Pacers might have been the team’s greatest display of overall chemistry.

Milwaukee put together a wire-to-wire win, but Indiana would not go away in the second half. The Bucks built a 25-point lead midway through the third, but as Bucks coach Doc Rivers described after the game, they thought it was “Showtime at the Apollo.” Multiple attempts at highlight plays led to turnovers that let the Pacers cut the Bucks’ lead to 14 entering the fourth quarter. Early in that frame, the Bucks built a 20-point lead, but the Pacers cut the lead down to six points, which forced Rivers to call a timeout with 5:52 remaining.

Three possessions later, though, Pacers coach Rick Carlisle wanted a timeout of his own as the Bucks responded with the game’s most spectacular sequence: a block by Antetokounmpo followed by an off-the-backboard alley-oop from Gary Trent Jr. to Antetokounmpo.

Trent and Antetokounmpo have only played 13 games together, and, although he was a starter at the beginning of the season, Trent has moved to the bench, so he and Antetokounmpo have played only 237 minutes together. Still, Trent knew that he could trust the Bucks’ best player to be there for him when he threw the ball off the glass instead of taking an open layup.

“I was super confident,” Trent said. “He made a tremendous play on the defensive end, so you got to reward him on the offensive end for that. So, I’m glad we had that opportunity, that moment. It was fun. “It was cool.”

After the game, Antetokounmpo joked that Trent’s pass had just earned the guard “a lot of open 3s.” After being informed Trent told reporters Antetokounmpo needed to be rewarded for his defensive play, the Bucks superstar forward turned serious.

“That’s incredible. That’s great spirit. That’s the spirit you want to have within your team,” Antetokounmpo said. “You’ve got to be selfless. There’s going to be times that a guy loads and he’s going to be wide-open, I gotta deliver the ball. As a leader, now, I gotta deliver the ball. It goes both ways. “It doesn’t only go one way.”

Antetokounmpo explained that Trent’s selflessness wasn’t just about the highlight play, but the offensive possession before it. The 5-0 run that forced a Pacers timeout started with a 3 from Trent.

Trent has caught fire for the Bucks. After struggling with back spasms to start the season, the Bucks’ new shooting guard has started to look like himself again coming off the bench for the Bucks. In his last five games, Trent has knocked down 18 of his 32 3-point attempts (56.3 percent) while playing 26.9 minutes per game. After knocking down the 3 on the play Rivers drew up out of the timeout, Trent had the opportunity to tally the five points that would eventually force a timeout for Carlisle.

Instead, Trent shared the moment with Antetokounmpo and rewarded the defensive effort with a pass that doesn’t even show up in the box score as an assist.

After winning just two of their first 10 games this season, the Bucks have won five of their last six, including both of their NBA Cup contests to take the top spot in East: Group B with a plus-26 point differential. Their superstar duo is putting together more moments of on-court synergy than ever, their defense has performed at a top-10 level in the month of November and they now have their first three-game winning streak of the season.

““I think the vibes with our team are high right now, and I think part of it is because we’ve experienced lows together,” Lillard said. “Sometimes, when you experience tough times and people are talking about our team and saying all kinds of stuff about our guys individually, they put you in a situation where it’s really just us. It’s us, and then it’s everybody else.

“So, when you in a hit together and then you start to come out of it, it’s not like we’re coming out of it and we’re not doing it together. We’re doing it together on both sides of the ball, and everyone’s getting opportunities.“

The Bucks are 7-9, two games below .500 this season, but they woke up on Saturday morning in sixth place in the Eastern Conference standings. After a horrid start to the season, the Bucks appear to be finding their groove.

(Photo of Giannis Antetokounmpo: Benny Sieu / Imagn Images)