It’s only been nine days; not nine months, although that sounds like it. On July 8, the NBA Finals traveled from Arizona to Wisconsin with a 2-0 which left the road in the first ring in its history perfectly downhill for the Suns. In Milwaukee, the audience sang “Bucks In Six” (the Bucks will win in six games) and listening to it almost produced tenderness, as if it was just that reality didn’t spoil a good party, the first final in the city since 1974, a loss to the Celtics three years after the only franchise title.
Only nine days have passed and the revolution is complete: 2-3, three wins in a row for a team that never gives up, never dies. Maybe because the last two years have shaken him too much, because he’s died so many times that it’s ultimately impossible to kill. It’s a paradox, but it does happen. The Bucks escaped 2-0 to the Nets and have now won three straight games against the Suns who had lost just four during their trip to the West. And they don’t know what it’s like to be in a league game. In their two finals (1976 and 1993), they lost 4-2. Now they have stranded each other again in these two victories and they need their special miracle so that the solar eclipse is not complete. They need two wins in 48 hours (Tuesday-Thursday). And above all, they need to believe. They now have two days to hang out on the psychoanalyst’s couch because he expects a peloton at the Fiserv Forum on Tuesday, where the Bucks are 9-1 in the playoffs.
The calculation adds to the sensations: at 2-2, whoever wins the fifth game is champion 72% of the time. But if the Suns can’t keep that 28%, they don’t deserve that ring. The 2-0 came back four times and, beware, in two of them it went straight to 2-4 with four straight wins, the hunter chased: Bill Walton’s Blazers did it to the Sixers in 1977 and Dwyane Wade’s Heat at the Mavericks in 2006. It’s weird, but it happened. And it’s a game to happen again. It will be, for the Bucks, very hard. The last step is always the most difficult. With the pressure of avoiding a seventh on the road, against a rival freed from the angst of victory, trying to escape the same grave the Bucks made a luxury apartment in. It’s a team of dungeons and agony, coming back from every shot, walking like a zombie when it should be dead, and hitting like a sledgehammer when it shouldn’t have the strength. It is resilience and punishment, the exact reserve of a few Suns full of talent but unable, until now, to escape the embers. From now on, they no longer have the choice: to rebel or give up, in Comanche territory and, suddenly, with everything against them. They can do it, but they need to get something from the inside that is beyond basketball that they haven’t had in the last two games of these 2021 Finals. They started in profile and prove to be valuable.
Jrue Holiday, the spirit of resistance
No one had won in the final and the Bucks did (119-123) the day the victory also left their rival without wild cards. The Suns found themselves stunned, with a smirk and a head full of noise, everything their rival had sucked from a few bleachers that went from rapture to agony in the fast lane, not knowing how. Until this match, the Suns had not failed in the playoffs (13-0) since their advantage exceeded +10. This time it was 37-21 after an extraordinary first quarter from Monty Williams, revitalized by the return home. Very aggressive in defense (6 losses for the Bucks in the first quarter after five totals in Game 4) and collective in attack, with Devin Booker leading the charge and Jae Crowder and Mikal Bridges punishing (15 points in between) at around Bucks disoriented, shaken. In 9 minutes, the match had gone to 32-16, the Suns made 78% of their shots in the first quarter (14/18) and their performance essentially involved the assurance of victory: only the Celtics in 2008 (21 in their case) had come back in the final (to the Lakers, in his case) more than 16 points from the first quarter.
Then came the eclipse, the silence, the umpteenth resurrection of the Bucks. That they are not buried, that they begin to play as if nothing had happened in the preceding minutes, as if a whirlwind had not carried them away. With Giannis Antetokounmpo on the bench and surprisingly facing a patent leather rival, the Bucks were back in the game in four and a half minutes (5-21 for 42-42) and led in six and a half (49-50). From there, they were always better. They maintained their focus and tenacity, they were more stable, harder, more consistent. They stayed true to their plan, when it worked wonderfully and when they had a hard time, and they had unwavering faith and a lot more character. Finally also more basketball: things got worse in the third quarter (75-85, 81-94) for some Suns whose rival defense withdrew their arms to become a succession of individual actions by Devin Booker. It worked, again. The keeper has scored 42 and 40 points in the last two games and his team have lost both. Without the collective connections, without the choral attacks and the extra highlight pass, the Suns are vulnerable as very good as Booker is. What if it was. And they lost even though they made 55% of their shots and 60% of their 3s. Never seen in the final.
The miracle happened: a 102-113 midway through the fourth quarter was squeezed to a frenzied 119-120 on the ball for the Suns. There was the game of the game, another of those (like the Antetokounmpo stopper in the fourth) that will be the story of the final if the Bucks are champions. With 16 seconds remaining, Jrue Holiday snatched the ball out of Booker’s hands (literally) and assisted in the transition for a dazzling alley oop from Giannis: 119-122 and an extra free throw for Chris Paul (foul) foul. The Greek missed, but slapped on a rebound that went from hand to hand and fell to Khris Middleton, who scored another free throw: 119-123, a knockout sealed by Booker’s latest misfires and a Chris Paul who played better this time and he had a heroic moment in the fourth quarter: 10 of his 21 points, a total of 11 assists for, this time, only one loss. The playmaker and Bridges’ 3 points backed the Suns, and Booker led the failed final charge. The Suns forgot to play the way they know and usually do. Or, quite simply, they were absolutely held back by the defensive and mental wall of an infernal and indefatigable rival. If these finals are a matter of blind faith, the Bucks are going to win.
It was the big three night, the three over 25 points and 50% on shots, something that in a final only Magic Johnson, James Worthy and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar had done with the Lakers 1985. Antetokounmpo returned to take everything, work on the whole track and perfectly adjust your moments, when to strike and when to put yourself in the hands of your teammates. He finished with 32 points (12 in the fourth quarter), 9 rebounds and 6 assists, and didn’t let a bad free throw day (4/11) dictate the rules for his night. Your head is a wall. Middleton picked his moments, started a dud and scored two decisive baskets to stop the Suns’ final assault. And 20 of his 29 points in the second half. But this time, without a doubt, the evening of Jrue Holiday: 27 points, 13 assists. Another impeccable and brutal defense, legendary, on Chris Paul, and finally an excellent evening in attack after his setbacks in previous matches. Never curled up, always ready to shoot and unable to hide, the point guard has come to the Bucks this season for precisely this: to give the ultimate boost. His exceptional defense in the second game deserved the spotlight award in attack, he deserved a sequence like this in the final, the flight and assistance to Giannis. A piece of the ring? We will see, but with this game still fresh it costs, at least, not to imagine it.
The Bucks squeezed the Suns, rallied them 16 points, stuck their tongue out at them for over half a game, and woke up when they dreamed of the miracle. Seen like this, it was torture for some absolutely seriously injured Suns, unable to match the energy their rival maintains when things go wrong, when blows don’t come in, or the opponent lets go of the claws. The Finals are at 2-3 and the Bucks in Six have stopped sounding like a joke and now sound like a premonition. It would be the first in fifty years and it would be, if it was Tuesday, at a Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee that it would be the center of the universe. The NBA is holding its breath, the final is reaching its critical moment, and the Bucks revolution so far seems unstoppable. The Suns have two days to come up with a plan. All or nothing, glory or hell: it’s not going any more.
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