Griffin Wong breaks down his analysis, prediction, and pick for Celtics at Bucks on Thursday.

Without Jayson Tatum, this Boston Celtics season was projected to be a gap year. Boston traded Kristaps Porziņġis and Jrue Holiday away, turning the keys fully to Jaylen Brown for the season and entrusting Neemias Queta with the starting center role. It’s worked better than even the most optimistic Celtics fan could have imagined, and Tatum has resumed one-on-one workouts just under seven months after his Achilles tear, gearing up for a possible return before the playoffs.

Boston, which currently holds the third seed in the East and has the second-best point differential in the conference, has a pretty easy game tonight against the Giannis Antetokounmpo-less Milwaukee Bucks. Besides Antetokounmpo, the Bucks should be pretty healthy, with only shooting specialist A.J. Green questionable. The Celtics’ rotation is completely healthy.

Boston is a 9.5-point favorite at DraftKings Sportsbook (-395 on the Moneyline), and the point total is set to 223.5. Milwaukee is +310 on the Moneyline. Below, I’ll break down tonight’s clash and offer my prediction.

Boston Celtics at Milwaukee Bucks preview, prediction

It was unclear whether Brown was up to the task of being the team’s top scoring option, but he has answered any questions pretty convincingly, averaging 29.1 points, 6.2 boards, and 4.9 assists per game, leading the league in two-point attempts, and shooting nearly 50% from the field. Derrick White’s and Payton Pritchard’s shots have heated up after a slow start to the season, and the Celtics have gotten unexpected contributions from players like Jordan Walsh and Josh Minott. This Boston team is winning much like the Tatum-led squads: launching with reckless abandon from deep and playing tough defense.

The Bucks, meanwhile, haven’t made a convincing case to keep Antetokounmpo around. They’re still hanging around the fringes of the Play-In Tournament picture despite Antetokounmpo being in and out of the lineup, but despite Ryan Rollins emerging as a two-way stud, they just don’t have enough talent to entice the Greek Freak that championship contention is possible in the near future. Milwaukee mortgaged its future to bring Myles Turner into the fold, and it’s hard to say that the 29-year-old — who’s shooting just 51.1% inside the arc and pulling down only 5.7 rebounds per game — has played well enough to justify its investment.

Celtics at Bucks pick, best bet

Antetokounmpo got hurt early in the Bucks’ win over the Detroit Pistons last Wednesday, and though they showed grit to win that game against the East’s best team (led by a 26-point effort from Kevin Porter Jr.), they weren’t particularly competitive in either of their subsequent losses against the Philadelphia 76ers and the Pistons. Overall, in the last 10 games — a span in which Antetokounmpo has totaled 82 minutes — Milwaukee is 2-8 and has had the 12th-worst offense and the ninth-worst defense. It has had the equivalent of the league’s best offense with Antetokounmpo on the floor and its fourth-worst with him off. Defensively, it hasn’t been great with or without the Greek Freak.

While the Bucks have done a good job in the last 10 games keeping opponents out of the paint — across that span, they’ve allowed the third-fewest points in the paint, one spot worse than the Celtics — their three-point defense has been an issue. Not only have they allowed the fourth-most made threes across that span, it isn’t really a function of luck: only the league-worst New Orleans Pelicans have allowed more wide-open threes, and Milwaukee has allowed merely the 13th-highest percentage on such shots. Boston, which generates uncontested looks at the seventh-highest rate and connects at above-average frequency, should be salivating.

Defensively, the Celtics have gotten in a groove. Only six teams have been better at defending the rim than Boston despite it trading away one of the league’s best high-volume rim protectors in Porziņġis, and only three teams have conceded a lower percentage from the non-restricted paint. The Celtics have also allowed among the fewest corner threes and forced opponents into an above-average number of less efficient mid-range jumpers and above-the-break threes while doing a good job closing out on shooters. Boston still fouls too much and doesn’t draw enough contact on the offensive end, but it turns the ball over at a league-low rate and makes the most of its takeaways on the other end. The Bucks have turned the ball over at an above-average rate over the last 10 games and have the same fouling issues as the Celtics do.

With neither team attempting very many shots in the paint (but finishing effectively once it does get downhill), this game should come down to the shooting, and while Milwaukee actually leads the league in three-point percentage, it hasn’t generated many uncontested looks and have still made fewer overall triples than Boston. Continuing to be without Green, who has made 50.0% of his uncontested looks this season and 48.5% of his triples overall, would massively hurt the team, especially since he’s been the second-most frequent recipient of Antetokounmpo’s passes this season, as well as the second-most frequent recipient of Rollins’.

Given that the Bucks’ offense has only been held afloat throughout Antetokounmpo’s absence by some fluky shooting on Porter’s part and the Celtics have had one of the league’s best three-point defenses, tonight’s game is a very bad matchup for Milwaukee. Boston should pick up its 11th win in 13 games and Antetokounmpo’s foot will slide even further out the door.

Best bet: Milwaukee Bucks U107.5 Points (-118)