After losing the first two games of the 2021 NBA Finals on the road in Phoenix, the Milwaukee Bucks responded on their home court and won Game 3, but Game 4 of this series quickly became yet another “must-win” game for them. Heading back to Phoenix potentially down 3-1 would have been as close to a death sentence for the Bucks as there could be in this series, but instead, this series is all evened up at two games a piece after Milwaukee held on to win Game 4 against the Suns 109-103.
This game was extremely close for all 48-minutes and no team led by double-digits in Game 4! Everytime the Suns went on a little bit of a run, Milwaukee responded and every time the Bucks went on a small run, Phoenix responded, but the Bucks were able to put together a couple of stops defensively late in the game to hang on for the victory.
One of these defensive stops came with about 1:14 left in the game when Devin Booker looked to drive past P.J. Tucker down the lane and threw a lob pass to DeAndre Ayton who was waiting on the baseline. Down two points, Phoenix was looking to get an Ayton slam to tie the game up, but Giannis Antetokounmpo came from the free-throw line and timed a block on Ayton’s dunk attempt perfectly without fouling him.
This was the turning point in Game 4 and this block has a chance to go down as one of the all-time greatest plays in NBA history if the Bucks are able to hold on and win this series. Now, there is still a lot of basketball left in what could very well be a seven-game series here in the NBA Finals, but just check out this unreal play from Antetokounmpo defensively.
Antetokounmpo’s block may not be considered a “game-saving” block since Milwaukee was leading at the time, but this should go down as a “series-saving” block for the Bucks and arguably the greatest block in NBA history, no disrespect to LeBron James’ block on Andre Iguodala back in the 2016 NBA Finals.
Game 4 of the 2021 NBA Finals had everything we wanted to see in this series and as a result, this series is now a “Best-of-3 series” with two of these games potentially in Phoenix. All the momentum in the NBA Finals is now in the hands of the Milwaukee Bucks, but as we stated in our Game 3 review, “a series never really begins until a team loses at home,” and so far, the home team has prevailed in every single game of this series.
Game 5 of this series in Phoenix is going to be loud, both teams are going to be energized and the winner of this series could very well go on to win the title this year, but before this game is played, let’s take a look back on the three biggest takeaways from Game 4 of the 2021 NBA Finals from Wednesday night.
