Unnecessary suffering, but win for Bucks in Game 1 of series against Bulls

The defending champion Milwaukee Bucks began the Larry O'Brien Trophy defense playoffs with an overtime deficit as they blew a 16-point lead, but came from behind to take the 93-86 win in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference first-round series against the Chicago Bulls on Sunday night.

With 5:03 minutes to play, the Bucks were surprisingly losing to a team they have totally dominated in the recent past, but a three-pointer by Jrue Holliday gave them a lead they would never relinquish as part of an unanswered eight-point run at the buzzer.

Milwaukee's total dominance over Chicago

Milwaukee won all four regular season games over Chicago and with this victory has now won 17 of the last 18 games, the only loss coming at the end of last season, with the eventual champions resting all starters for those unforgettable playoffs that brought them back the NBA championship after a half-century of fasting.

The Bucks' scoring leader was the usual Greek Giannis Antetokounmpo, who had a triple-double producing 27 points and 16 rebounds that ended up being key to Milwaukee's win.

Other Bucks players who scored in double digits were Brook Lopez with 18 points, Holiday, who added 15, Khris Middleton who contributed 11 points and Bobby Portis who scored 10 points.

Poor offense for the Bulls

For Chicago's losing cause, the offense fell flat, averaging 32.3% from the field and making the defending champions' defense look bad. The leading scorers were Nikola Vucevic with 24 points and 17 rebounds, DeMar DeRozan and Zach LaVine with 18 points and Cody White with 12 points.

What's next in the series?

Game 2 of this series which is the first to win four of seven games will be played, also in Milwaukee, next Wednesday at 9:30 pm ET.

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