Milwaukee Bucks found themselves in a similar position on Saturday as they did last Sunday against Houston. They had a big lead late and just needed one or two more baskets to close out the team. Then weird shit started to happen. Miss shot here, a second or third chance for the opposing team there. Milwaukee blew a seven-point lead with 2:38 left to go in the game as Dallas forced overtime. Mavericks would win in OT thanks to an incredible performance by Luka Doncic. Milwaukee falls to 2-3 in the bubble, and the constant need to remind yourself that these games aren’t very important is needed.

Player of the Game: Luka Doncic – For Brewers recap blog posts, I give opposing players the POG all the time. I rarely do it for basketball mostly because Giannis Antetokounmpo puts a great stat line in a losing effort. Not this time around. Luka Doncic takes the award for his performance on Saturday. Doncic finished with 35 points, 19 assists, and 14 rebounds. Playing against Giannis on ESPN Saturday night primetime was an ultimate hello world moment for Luka. It will be interesting to see if the pundits play up a Giannis-Luka rivalry.

Honorable Mention: Brook Lopez – What a night for Brook. He played his ass in this one. Brook finished with a season-high 34 points with seven rebounds and two blocks. He added six threes in this one. Lopez dominated the second quarter and played a large part in Milwaukee having a lead heading into the break. Bucks need to use Lopez’s strong post game as a solution for these small lineups. They’re no match for Brook.

One thing to talk about – So worry about late-game situations?: Sure, it is worth considering, but as ESPN’s Jeff Van Gundy said, the Bucks haven’t been in these spots enough this year. It is good for them to learn how to finish in a late-game scenario. For them, they need to keep their composure which starts with Giannis. Hopefully, this isn’t a youth thing. With being among the greats, the expectation is you know how to close out a basketball game.

Next up: Milwaukee takes on Toronto in their last meaningful game of the bubble. Washington and Memphis are very meaningless for the Bucks to finish the week. Bucks will likely go full-bore here, although, I could see Toronto resting some of their guys after they clinched the two seed yesterday.

Charlie.