There have been some historic collapses in the NBA during the 2023-24 regular season. Teams are never out of a game, regardless of the deficit they are facing, with how lax some teams get on defense and the pur volume teams are shooting 3-pointers at currently.
On Monday night, we saw the Boston Celtics blow a 30-point lead to the Atlanta Hawks. On Tuesday night, it was the Milwaukee Bucks’ turn to blow a lead. Milwaukee had a 99.8 percent chance of defeating the Los Angeles Lakers, holding a lead as large as 19 points, but they could not seal the deal.
Los Angeles stormed back despite not having LeBron James in the lineup. Anthony Davis, Austin Reaves and D’Angelo Russell put the team on their back and eventually came away with an improbable 128-124 victory in double-overtime.
A lot needs to go wrong for a team to blow that kind of lead in such a small amount of time and it all went the Lakers’ way. A lot of that was a lack of attention to detail near the end of the game, as Bucks head coach Doc Rivers said his team took their foot off the gas.
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“We let our foot off and we got burned,” Rivers said. “That’s all that is. When we played right at the beginning of the game, it was beautiful basketball. We stopped playing right and thought we could still win and we couldn’t.”
For many teams, this would be seen as an anomaly, a one-time thing that won’t occur too often. But, for a Rivers-led team, this is yet another example of them not being able to close the deal late and blowing big leads.
The fans of any NBA team that has had Rivers as their head coach have a little bit of PTSD from seeing the Bucks collapse. It is what his teams have become known for throughout his head coach career, which should make Milwaukee fans a little nervous heading into the postseason.
The Bucks have all the pieces they need to be contenders in the Eastern Conference. They have some of the most dominant three-man trios in the NBA. But, will they have enough to shake the Rivers curse that has followed him throughout his career in the postseason? Only time will tell.
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