Again, the Bucks fell behind early with two straight losses to the Suns before rallying for four straight victories to clinch their first title in 50 years. Milwaukee went on to win in overtime and got past Atlanta in six games to advance to the Finals. After evening the series with two straight victories at home, the teams split the next two to set up a decisive Game 7 in Brooklyn where the Bucks’ season likely would have ended had Kevin Durant’s size 14 foot not been on the 3-point line when he knocked down a long, game-tying 2-pointer at the end of regulation. After opening the postseason with an easy sweep of Miami, Milwaukee dropped two straight to Brooklyn in the second round.

The Bucks finished with their worst record under Budenholzer, going 46-36 to earn the East’s No. Milwaukee finally got over the hump in 2021 but even then, the road to the title was far from dominant.

When the league restarted in its Florida bubble, the Bucks won just two of five “seeding-round” games but after easily dispatching Orlando in the first round, dropped three straight to Miami in the conference semifinals before ultimately bowing out in five games. The Bucks followed that by sweeping Detroit in the first round, then bouncing back from a Game 1 loss to Boston with four straight victories in the Eastern Conference Semifinals before taking a 2-0 lead over Toronto in the conference finals.īut with a chance to advance to the NBA Finals for the first time since 1974, the Bucks instead dropped four straight to the Raptors, who went on to win their first-ever NBA Championship.Ī year later, the Bucks were again a regular-season powerhouse and held the league’s best record when the burgeoning COVID-19 pandemic brought the schedule – and world – to a sudden stop in March. Milwaukee blew through the regular season, finishing a league-best 60-22 to earn the No. Let’s take a trip down history lane, shall we?Īfter their rebuild stalled under Kidd, the Bucks went out and hired Budenholzer as head coach and the results were mind-blowing.

Crossroads jonathan