The Phoenix suns always found an answer to the one-way bet of the Milwaukee bucks, who entrusted their luck to a Giannis Antetokounmpo colossal and they fell short once again before the choral philosophy of the local group. The Arizona franchise kept the home court factor intact with a solvent victory by 118-108 in the second game of the NBA Finals that places the 2-0 in the tie for the ring.
Devin Booker, with 31 points, 6 assists, Y Chris paul, author of 23 points and 8 assists, once again led the Suns’ display against their raucous fans, absolutely ecstatic at the sight of their team’s excellent performance and clear superiority for the second game in a row.
Despite the loss of Dario Saric and the injury of Torrey Craig, Monty Williams’ team knew how to find its best collective version again and used all its resources to break the heroic effort of Antetokounmpo.
The Greek player finished the match with 42 points, 12 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 blocks in 40 minutes of playAn effort that gave him cramps and made him wince from the pain in his bruised knee.
The Bucks’ double MVP looked too lonely despite his great game, and it was clear that Khris middleton (11 points, 5-16 shooting from the field) is not going through his best moment in these Finals. Jrue Holiday, with 17 goals and 7 assists, he was the only one who collaborated a little, although he did so when it was too late.
Phoenix recovered in the second quarter of a bad start and managed to turn the scoreboard with a partial of 30-16 to travel with a comfortable advantage of +11 at halftime (56-45). Phoenix lost by 9 points in the first room. Since then, the Suns have been dedicated to responding with their colorful repertoire to the attacks of Anteto, who finished with 20 points in the third quarter, something unprecedented in the NBA Finals of the last 25 years -LeBron and Kobe scored a maximum of 19, and the last to overcome Anteto’s effort was Jordan in 1993-.
The lack of success in the triples (9-31) and Anteto’s doubts from the staff line (11-18) finished condemning the visitors, who saw how the locals shot them from the perimeter. Phoenix finished the game with 20 triples, the second-best record in history.
to in a Finals after the Cavaliers of 2017 (24) and on par with the Warriors of 2019 (20).
Booker scored 7 of 12 from the perimeter, recalling the posthumous advice of Kobe bryant. “If he were here he would tell me to go out there to finish the job”, had declared before the second game in a report on American television. Without a doubt, the young Hispanic point guard followed his advice to the letter. “We try to win whatever the cost. We wanted to keep the 10-point cushion in the second half “explained the 24-year-old as soon as the match ended.
Besides Booker and Paul, Mikal Bridges did an excellent job for the Suns. The forward made a complete break to Middleton, who in addition to his bad offensive performance suffered a lot to try to stop him on the other side of the track. The secondary of the Suns, with 27 points, he achieved his best scoring mark in a playoff game and added 7 rebounds to his best night in the league so far.
Milwaukee’s resistance again lasted just a quarter, first. The Bucks finished 29-26 the opening set of the match after managing to penetrate the rival paint with a partial of 20-0 in the zone (54-20 in favor of Milwaukee at the end) They also achieved another of their goals, stop bleeding from free kicks: the first for Phoenix came seconds before the break with a 2 + 1 of Deandre ayton, which made a more discreet but well-rounded match with 10 points, 11 rebounds, 4 assists, 3 steals and 2 blocks.
Mike Budenholzer’s team corrections came to nothing against the depth of Monty Williams’ team, more confident on the track. Jae Crowder scored 11 points and grabbed 10 rebounds and appeared with his first basket in the tie as soon as the game begins. All five Phoenix starters finished in double digits, while the bench responded despite seeing their rotation shortened by injuries.
Cameron Johnson enjoyed 18 minutes and answered with 8 points, while Torrey Craig left injured with 6 points in 8 minutes after hitting knee to knee with Antetokounmpo, who also hurt from the play. The contrast for the Bucks could not be greater: only Pat Connaughton answered his coach’s call with 14 points and 7 rebounds from the bank.
The rest was a lot for Milwaukee, which should bring out all its collective talent of the last seasons, mysteriously disappeared in these NBA Finals. Despite the clear triumph of Phoenix and everything demonstrated in the series, Booker advocated prudence in the post-match interview: “Our mentality is that we go 0-0 to the third game. We are prepared for the environment in Milwaukee. “