Milwaukee Bucks First Round Playoff Preview – Bucks vs Indiana Pacers

Can the Bucks handle Indiana's Pace?

The Milwaukee Bucks’ first-round series was never going to feel particularly easy with the way the Bucks stumbled to the finish line of the 2023-24 NBA season, and losing Giannis Antetokounmpo for at least part of the series only intensified the challenge looming in the spunky Indiana Pacers.

In preparing for a crossover podcast with Setting the Pace (check them out for the opposition intel this series, and here’s links to the episode on Apple and Spotify) I decided to put together my notes on the series, and figured I would share them here on Substack too. I’m going to go through how I picture the starters matching up on both ends, as well as key bench players for both sides, and general factors that feel important to the series.

Starter Match-Ups

I anticipate the Bucks will be starting Damian Lillard, Patrick Beverley, Khris Middleton, Bobby Portis, and Brook Lopez given the way they finished the regular season without Giannis. Indiana’s regular starting lineup post-NBA Trade Deadline and Bennedict Mathurin injury has been Tyrese Haliburton, Andrew Nembhard, Aaron Nesmith, Pascal Siakam, and Myles Turner.

There are some intriguing options for the Bucks with their defensive match-ups that didn’t exist previously in their match-ups with Indiana. The starting points are easy: Pat Bev will guard Haliburton, and Brook Lopez will guard Turner (to start). I think there’s a third “easy” match-up here with Dame guarding Nembhard as he is least threatening scorer on the floor for Indy.

The rub is who guards Pascal Siakam with no Giannis to stick on him. I think the Bucks will take shifts, and a certain bench player will factor in heavily, but with these starters I think Portis gets the first crack, with Khris Middleton put on Nesmith and able to not work as hard defensively. That is especially beneficial given the offensive load Middleton will need to carry throughout this first round.

Chess Moves

The Bucks have a pair of interesting pivots they can make defensively, both involving Brook Lopez. Doc Mister Rivers can of course go small, putting Portis at the 5 and giving him the Turner assignment and adding a bench wing. Jae Crowder is poised to play a huge role in this series if he can make Siakam work for his buckets. Crowder has struggled at times with quicker players, but Siakam will be a good test to see how impactful Crowder can be on bigger star forwards this postseason.

The other option is to stick Lopez on a non-shooter, to keep him in the paint instead of being dragged into Haliburton/Turner pick and pops. For as good as these Pacers are offensively, the losses of Mathurin and Buddy Hield robbed Indiana of two of their better shooters. Nesmith has evolved to shoot 40+% so you don’t want to leave him wide open, but Nembhard is at 35.7% this season after shooting 35% last season too. Ben Sheppard, a rookie wing defender who’s also found himself in a big rotation role, is below 32%. T.J. McConnell, noted Bucks killer, shoots a high percentage but on low volume: he’s made 16 total threes in February, March, and April combined (although three of them came in Game 82 against Atlanta, so he’s heating up). I don’t think Mister Rivers will be able to put Lopez on non-spacers for huge minutes, but it does loom as a good pivot. Going to a zone will be too, although Indiana has had success against Adrian Griffin’s zone looks, so the Bucks will have to continue their physical presence to make that work better for them.

The most interesting defensive question for Indiana is how they go about managing Milwaukee’s size advantage. I think we’ll see Haliburton guard Pat Bev (both teams dragging the opposing star point guard into actions will be an important lever-pull to watch) and assume Nembhard guards Dame and Nesmith guards Middleton. I think from there Siakam guarding Portis and Turner guarding Lopez makes the most sense.

Handling the Pacer Stars

The Siakam-Portis match-up looms as a crucial and fascinating one. Portis bringing the offensive impact he’s displayed in the games Giannis has missed is essential, as is offering some resistance to Siakam. If things go quite badly for Portis, Mister Rivers could be forced into altering the starting 5. If they go quite well, it could swing the series and buy Giannis some more recovery time.

The Bucks have not played the Pacers since acquiring Mister Rivers and Pat Bev, but Pat Bev has played Indiana three times with the 76ers. Haliburton didn’t play one of those games, and according to NBA dot com match-up data from the box scores Bev didn’t spend too much time guarding him in the other two.

On November 15 in an In-Season Tournament group stage game, Beverley spent 4:15 guarding Haliburton. In that time, Haliburton scored 7 points on 2/4 shooting and added 5 assists. Then, on November 12, Beverley guarded Haliburton for just 50 seconds. Haliburton didn’t attempt a field goal, but did accrue 2 assists.

Beverley will get the first crack, but won’t be the only Bucks player tasked with guarding Haliburton. Lillard will get some possessions throughout the course of the series, as will Malik Beasley and probably one of A.J. Green or Andre Jackson Jr. None of those players will be able to shut down Haliburton, even as he’s slowed down post-IST, but Milwaukee finding at least 2 players who can do a reasonable job on him will be key.

Can Milwaukee Keep Up?

The overall pace of the series is going to be a huge factor too. The Pacers like to run. Haliburton himself noted that while the Mister Rivers Bucks are better in transition, his Indiana team runs different than others. He’s right: only the Washington Wizards play faster according to the NBA’s pace statistic (which may explain why the Bucks struggled against the ‘Zards too).

The Bucks have focused on preparing for this – the scout team, made up of the young Bucks, isn’t even inbounding the ball after made baskets. They’re just running straight up the floor once the ball goes through the rim. Mister Rivers has also discussed how the Bucks need to take better shots, not settling for early jumpers and instead focusing on high percentage looks to slow down Indiana.

My original take was the Bucks should focus on splitting games until Giannis is able to return. The closer we get to the series starting, the more it feels like Lillard, Middleton, Portis, Lopez and company need to start this thing on the right foot and take Game 1. If they can manage winning two without Giannis at home to start, my Bucks in 7 prediction will be overly conservative, but I think it's in play.

I've groused about Lillard plenty, but this is the time of year – and kind of situation – you blow up a proven core to add a superstar into. Dame has not looked like a superstar for much of this season, but with time off and knowing he’s close to his best shot at a title should result in a focused and deadly Dame on Sunday night. If the Bucks get that guy, the rest of the NBA will have to fear the deer.

Final prediction: Bucks in 7 after they split the first four games without Giannis.