Nets rest 3 starters, barely play 2 others in blowout loss to Bucks
If those guys were out there, it wasn’t for long.
Eventually, Antetokounmpo and his Milwaukee teammates figured things out against opponents they had to learn about on the fly.
Antetokounmpo had 32 points, 10 rebounds and eight assists, Khris Middleton added 27 points and 10 assists, and the Bucks pulled away for a 144-122 victory Wednesday night over a Brooklyn team that treated it like a preseason game.
The Nets rested three starters and barely played two others on the night after a victory at Detroit that extended the Pistons’ losing streak to 27, an NB
“They competed hard,” Antetokounmpo said. “I don’t know most of them but definitely I’ll learn them after today because they made it extremely, extremely tough for us.”
The Nets’ rotation featuring a number of rookies and players on two-way contracts put up a good fight for three quarters before the Bucks put them away.
Afterward, coach Jacque Vaughn passionately denied treating the game like one played in mid-October.
“I have too much respect for the dudes that suit up and put their body on the line and the competition level to even mention the word exhibition,” he said. “Any guy could have ended their career tonight by one play and so I treat it as such. It is an honor, it is, I don’t know, a sense of gratitude that you do this for a living and you never, ever underestimate that. If you do, you’ll pay for it.”
