The Atlanta Hawks are facing a Milwaukee Bucks team without their two-time MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo in the fifth game of the Eastern Conference Finals per Shams of the Athletic. This is not good news for the Bucks as they rely heavily on their star to produce winning basketball.
However, as seen by Game 4, when a team loses a star player, the opposition may relax their efforts slightly, meaning they are on the back foot. Even before Antetokounmpo went down in the second half of the fourth game, the Hawks were on top due to the efforts of the rest of the players.
The Bucks still have the talents of Jrue Holiday, Khris Middleton, and Brook Lopez. All of these players can take the game away from the Hawks on any given night. We only have to look at the third game of the series when Middleton outscored the Hawks by himself in the last period 20 to 17.
The Atlanta Hawks need to remain on high alert of the Milwaukee Bucks.
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The Bucks still have plenty of players who can pull a Lou Williams and dominate their opposition the way the three-time sixth man of the year did in his first career start. As noted by my co-site expert Joshua Buckhalter, the Hawks cannot afford to go to sleep on this game.
The Hawks need to continue to use the rotations from the last game where Cam Reddish took the minutes of Solomon Hill because of his two-way efforts on the court. He is going to be crucial to stopping Middleton who is going to try and carry the Bucks on his shoulders.
At the time of writing the Hawks have not released whether Clint Capela or Trae Young are in or out of the team for this game. If both of these players are in, then the Hawks should be able to gain the advantage in the series.
If they are out, the rest of the team will need to try and emulate their performance from the last game. With the change in venue, the Bucks will be primed to try and take the game for the Hawks.