ATLANTA _ Over the first five games of the season, the Milwaukee Bucks established they can hang with tough competition. On Sunday afternoon against the Atlanta Hawks, the Bucks were faced with a different set of tasks.
In recent seasons past, the Bucks haven't been great about taking care of business against teams they're supposed to beat. The Bucks also have had a history of struggling in day games.
Neither fact was lost on the Bucks on Sunday, as they did their best to put both of those trends to rest. Milwaukee knocked the Hawks to the mat early and never let them up, leading by double digits for the final 39:44 of the game on the way to a 117-106 victory at Philips Arena that sent the Hawks to their sixth straight loss.
Giannis Antetokounmpo led the way with 33 points and 11 rebounds, setting the tone almost immediately off the jump. He knocked down a long two-pointer, stroked a 3-pointer, added a layup and a putback for the Bucks' first nine points in three minutes. He then pushed ahead off an Atlanta turnover and found Tony Snell for a 3-pointer to give the Bucks their first 10-point lead less than 3 { minutes into the contest.
"It was really important," Antetokounmpo said of setting the tone early. "Usually in games like this, early games Sunday morning, you come out a little bit lazy. We've done that in the past. For me, personally, I just wanted to set a good tone, come out aggressive, play hard so everyone could see that and play hard and be aggressive."
Antetokounmpo's plan worked to perfection.
The Bucks took that early spark and pushed their lead as high as 23 points in the second quarter. Milwaukee's offense, which struggled with ball movement and shot creation on Thursday against the Boston Celtics, returned to its proper working order on Sunday.
No matter who was in the game the ball kept moving. That opened up plenty of great 3-point looks, of which the Bucks made a season-high 13 on 26 attempts.
"It was an A in effort," coach Jason Kidd said about the offense carrying over the message of ball movement from practice.
"I thought they were making the conscious effort to move the ball whoever was on the floor. We're trying to limit zero-pass shots, we're not very good when we do that. I thought, again, the ball going to the second side. ... I thought guys were sharing the ball, I think 30 assists showed that."
Khris Middleton was responsible for nearly a third of the team's assists, dishing out nine. He got off to a slow start shooting, going 2 of 11 from the floor in the first half, but went into the break with the team plus-18 in his minutes on the court.
Middleton's shot caught up with him as he made 7 of 8 shots in the second half to finish with a season-high 27 points. That didn't mean the assists stopped, as he added five more to go along with seven rebounds in the game.
"We all believe in Khris that he's going to make the right play," Kidd said. "As bad as he shot in the first half he still was plus-26 (for the game) on the stat sheet and almost had a triple-double. The first half wasn't pretty but Khris is one who's a grownup, stays with the game plan and makes open shots when he has to."
