{"id":644714,"date":"2026-03-07T05:33:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T05:33:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/644714\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T05:33:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T05:33:14","slug":"bucks-notes-losing-streak-rivers-kuzma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/644714\/","title":{"rendered":"Bucks Notes: Losing Streak, Rivers, Kuzma"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Bucks have made the playoffs each of the past nine years, but they\u2019re running out of games to do so again in 2025\/26, writes Eric Nehm of The Athletic<\/a>. The team was up 13 points after the first quarter on Wednesday vs. Atlanta, but was outscored by 31 for the rest of the game, ultimately losing by 18.<\/p>\n

Wednesday marked Milwaukee\u2019s fourth straight loss. And the Bucks aren\u2019t just losing, they\u2019re getting blown out \u2014 they\u2019ve lost those games by a combined 97 points, the largest combined margin of defeat in a four-game losing streak in franchise history, per Nehm.<\/p>\n

Dropping the game to the Hawks was particularly rough for the Bucks, Nehm notes, as they\u2019re trying to catch Atlanta and Charlotte to make the play-in tournament. With 21 games remaining, Milwaukee is now five games behind Atlanta and four-and-a-half behind Charlotte for the final two play-in spots.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like we have the answers,\u201d said Giannis Antetokounmpo<\/a>, who finished with 24 points, five rebounds and four assists in his second game back from a calf strain. \u201cThe team is extremely talented. We have guys that can put the ball on the floor, guys that can put the ball in the basket.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day, it\u2019s like your spirit, what are you playing for? That\u2019s what we gotta decide. Are we going to wave the white flag, or are we going to come together in the last 21 games and try to play hard and try to make a push?<\/p>\n

\u201cAtlanta was the team above us, and a game like this counts for two. I feel like we came out and set the tone. We were shooting 60 percent from the field, but after that, we just fell flat.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s more on the Bucks:<\/p>\n

The four-game skid was directly preceded by Milwaukee winning eight of 10 games. Veteran big man Bobby Portis<\/a> wonders if that surprising stretch was a fluke, Nehm adds in the same story. \u201cKind of fool\u2019s gold, for real,\u201d Portis said. \u201cRolling eight out of 10, playing against bottom teams, teams that\u2019s trying to lose, right? (Now we are) playing against some teams that are jockeying for position. We used to be in that position, too. Jockeying for position, you got certain games on your schedule that you can\u2019t lose. Guys are circling us, and we\u2019re the can\u2019t-lose team, so, they\u2019re coming in and trying to win that game. That\u2019s a must-win game for them, can\u2019t drop it. That\u2019s how they\u2019re looking at us. So, credit the other teams for locking in and getting a dub, but on our side, we gotta look at it as the hungry team, the team that\u2019s hunting them now. Crazy how fast time and things can change and shift, but so much season left, right? We got 5 1\/2, six weeks to fix it, and I think we will.\u201d
\nStephen A. Smith claimed on his radio show that Doc Rivers plans to retire after the season. The 64-year-old head coach said there was nothing to that speculation, according to Nehm of The Athletic<\/a>. \u201cNo, I\u2019m not getting into that,\u201d Rivers said when asked about Smith\u2019s claim after Friday\u2019s practice. \u201cThat\u2019s something that; I think he feels that way, but not for me.\u201d Rivers is under contract through next season, Nehm observes.
\nForward Kyle Kuzma<\/a> received the first DNP-CD of his career on Monday. Speaking to the media on Friday for the first time since that game, Kuzma said he wasn\u2019t informed of the decision in advance (Twitter<\/a> links<\/a> via Nehm). \u201cAt the end of the day, Doc is the final arbiter, right? So he can make decisions on whatever he wants and rightfully so, he\u2019s the coach,\u201d Kuzma said. \u201cSo, that\u2019s not my job to worry about. My job is to come out and just be a professional. That\u2019s who I am. \u2026 You just take it in swing. At the end of the day, we trust our coaching staff to make the right decisions on this team or whatever they think can win us games.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Bucks have made the playoffs each of the past nine years, but they\u2019re running out of games…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":644715,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3775],"tags":[7,507,103,2660,123,124,102,121,3871,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-644714","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-milwaukee-bucks","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-bobby-portis","10":"tag-bucks","11":"tag-doc-rivers","12":"tag-giannis-antetokounmpo","13":"tag-kyle-kuzma","14":"tag-milwaukee","15":"tag-milwaukee-bucks","16":"tag-milwaukeebucks","17":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116186264782063199","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=644714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644714\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/644715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=644714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=644714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=644714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}