Bucks at Raptors
The Toronto Raptors finished the regular season with four consecutive victories and aim to keep the momentum going when they host the Milwaukee Bucks on Saturday in the opener of the Eastern Conference first-round series. Third-seeded Toronto is looking to reach the conference finals for the second straight season while the sixth-seeded Bucks are aiming to win a playoff series for the first time since the 2000-01 campaign.
Though Toronto has experienced much more recent playoff success, point guard Kyle Lowry said that the advantage is minimal. "The playoffs are a different beast," Lowry told reporters. "No matter what you've done last year or the year before, this is a completely new slate. We can't take what we did last year and bring it into this playoffs aside from experience." Milwaukee finished above .500 for the first time since going 46-36 in 2009-10 and is looking to halt a stretch of six consecutive first-round playoff exits. "People don't expect us to beat the Raptors," rookie shooting guard Malcolm Brogdon told reporters. "People didn't expect us to make the playoffs after we lost a few games during the regular season. We're going in with an underdog mentality to prove people wrong."
TV: 5:30 p.m. ET, ESPN, FSN Wisconsin (Milwaukee), Sportsnet One (Toronto)
ABOUT THE BUCKS (42-40): All-Star small forward Giannis Antetokounmpo will be expected to carry Milwaukee after becoming the fifth player in NBA history to lead his team in scoring (22.9), rebounding (8.8), assists (5.4), blocked shots (1.9) and steals (1.6) in the same season. The 22-year-old Antetokounmpo averaged 24.8 points, 7.8 rebounds and seven assists in four games against Toronto this season and feels his club's strong second half is a good sign in terms of performing better than the first-round exit against the Chicago Bulls two seasons ago. "We feel good about ourselves," Antetokounmpo told reporters. "In the second half after the All-Star break, we played great basketball, team basketball. A lot of people expect a lot from us, to do better than two years ago."
ABOUT THE RAPTORS (51-31): The Raptors lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers in six games in the East finals last season and shooting guard DeMar DeRozan is pointing to another sustained postseason run. "We understand what it takes to get there," DeRozan told reporters. "Let's take it one game at a time and with that understand what we've got to do to get there and how hard it is. That's our mentality this time around." DeRozan, who had 32 30-point outings while averaging 27.3 points this season, averaged 22.3 points in three outings against the Bucks.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. The Raptors were 3-1 against the Bucks this season and won 13 of the past 15 meetings.
2. Milwaukee averaged just 88.2 points over its final five regular-season games, scoring 90 or fewer in four of them.
3. Toronto is 25-4 when holding opponents below 100 points.