The Toronto Raptors and Milwaukee Bucks have traded games in this series thus far. Milwaukee stole the first game of the series in Toronto, which the Raptors answered with a narrow win in Game 2. When the scene shifted to Milwaukee, the Bucks again scored a big victory, but the Raptors responded to the bell with a win in Game 4. Milwaukee will look to keep this trend going with a win in Game 5, but Toronto knows it needs to win at home if it wants to survive.
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Milwaukee dominated in its two victories this series. The Bucks won by an average of 20.5 points and completely shut the Raptors down offensively. Toronto’s wins have been closer and the outcome has been in doubt much longer, but the team has shown off its ability to come through in the clutch.
Under has been an easy winner for three of the four games in this series. Although the totals keep coming out in the mid-190s, one side has been held to 83 points or fewer in every game but Game 2. The Bucks perimeter defense has played a huge part in this, holding DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry in check for long stretches.
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Turnovers killed Milwaukee on Saturday. The Bucks are not a particularly great shooting team so they need to limit their number of turnovers and that was on full display in Game 4.
Milwaukee managed to score just 76 points on the night thanks in large part to a 21 turnover performance. Giannis Antetokounmpo was the biggest violator, turning the ball over seven times on the night, but no one on the team was unscathed except for Michael Beasley.
Combining the turnovers with a night in which the Bucks shot 37 percent from the floor totally killed Milwaukee’s chances. Although the Bucks were again surprisingly strong on the boards with 50 rebounds and 13 offensive boards, that wasn’t enough to mitigate the damage caused by the turnovers and poor shooting.
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It’s becoming increasingly clear that the Raptors’ offense stalls out if DeRozan isn’t playing well. Just take a look at his performances in wins against his performances in losses over the first four games of the series and you can see a clear difference.
In Toronto’s two losses, he is just 7 of 29 from the floor. That includes a Game 3 performance which was the worst of his career, with DeRozan failing to hit a field goal during the game. However, in the victories, he has gone off, hitting 21 of 40 from the floor. DeRozan is going to need another good performance for Toronto in Game 5.
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The Raptors’ big men have to start playing up to their size. Toronto wasn’t a particularly great rebounding team in the regular season, but had a huge size advantage over Milwaukee and was expected to exploit it. That has yet to come to fruition though with Greg Monroe and the Greek Freak doing a pretty respectable job on the glass. Serge Ibaka and Jonas Valanciunas are going to have to channel the energy that Bismack Biyombo tapped into last season.
In this pivotal Game 5, look for the scoring to remain in check with both defenses putting on great performances. Although that would typically give the advantage to the home team, especially if that team was full of veterans, there’s something special about this Milwaukee team. Look for the Bucks to pull off the upset here and close out the series in Game 6.
NBA Odds: Bucks 95, Raptors 91
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