Marquette In The WNBA/NBA Bubble: August 18, 2020

Orlando Magic 122, Milwaukee Bucks 110 — Uh, say what happened in Milwaukee’s first playoff game?

Bucks led in the very early going, fell behind almost instantly by 10, ran off a 9-0 run to make it close, let the Magic lead by 10 at the end of the first quarter and that was honestly kind of that.

The biggest Orlando lead came at 18 points midway through the second quarter. I guess that wasn’t really it, because Milwaukee cut the margin to just one with 8:33 left in the third. Khris Middleton hit two of three freebies at that point. The Bucks wouldn’t score again for another minute, and by that point, it was Giannis Antetokounmpo getting a layup to pull within four. The Magic kept Milwaukee at an arm’s length from there and had full control of the game for the entire fourth quarter.

If you were thinking “well, Milwaukee just needed to shake off some rust, that’s why they went 3-8 in the Restart,” it’s officially time to wonder what the hell is going on with this team.

We’re here for Wesley Matthews content, of course. The Marquette man went for 10 points, four rebounds, two assists, and a steal in this one. That’s not terrible. Okay, I just realized the Bucks wasted a 31/17/7 from Giannis. Yuck.

Miami Heat 113, Indiana Pacers 101 — Marquette’s very own Jimmy Butler scored 10 of his 28 points in the fourth quarter as Miami recovered from blowing a 10 point third quarter lead to run away with the game in the fourth quarter and take a 1-0 lead in this Eastern Conference series.

All 10 of those points came in the final four minutes of the game, and he got his first six on his first two shots of the quarter. Butler hit a three with 3:26 to go to stake the Heat to a nine point lead, 104-95, and another a minute later to make it 107-95. That was really just Jimmy letting Indiana know that it was over for them, of course, as the Pacers led 87-85 with 9:43 to go. Goran Dragic did the heavy lifting to get Miami out in front, ripping through 10 points of his own before Butler scored to move the game from 89-87 Miami to 101-93 favoring the Heat. Pretty neat, huh?

Butler finished with 28 points to lead the Heat, and added three rebounds, four assists, four steals, and two blocks. Jae Crowder hit two of his five long range attempts in the game to tally eight points and he added five rebounds, too.

Connecticut Sun 84, Indiana Fever 62 — And that’s how you send a message to your near-standings rivals. DeWanna Bonner knocked in a game high 28 points — almost more than any two Indiana players combined — as Connecticut moved to 5-7 on the season and shifted into seventh place in the WNBA standings.

Here’s the important part of the game summarized for you by Alexa Philippou of the Hartford Courant:

Yeah, that’ll do it.

There’s other important notes, like Connecticut shooting over 40% behind the arc, or the Sun getting 21 assists on 33 buckets. But an 18-0 run to turn what was a competitive and interesting game into a blow out across just six minutes of time is pretty much all that matters at the end of the day.

Head coach Curt Miller was able to get his bench some quality time on the court, and that led to 14-plus minutes of run for Natisha Hiedeman. She went 2-for-3 from the floor to finish with five points after canning her only long range attempt of the game. She also had a rebound and three assists.

Up Next: A 9pm Central start on Thursday awaits Connecticut for their next outing. They’ll tangle with Las Vegas in that one, and the Aces are currently the second best team in the league even after losing to Chicago on Tuesday night.

Over at Disney World, Milwaukee will attempt to shake off whatever the hell happened in Game #1 when they tangle with the Magic in Game #2 on Thursday evening. It’s a 5pm CT start, and it’ll be on ESPN. Miami’s Game #2 against Indiana comes on Thursday as well. They get the early start at noon CT on ESPN.