The Bucks are making a statement to win the NBA Cup title

The Milwaukee Bucks are the NBA Cup champions.

Is an NBA title next?

Too early? Fine. We is just over a quarter of the way through the NBA season. And history – very recent history, as that’s all there is to the league’s fledgling tournament of the season – has not been kind to the Cup champions. The Los Angeles Lakers lifted the first Cup trophy last season. They went 3-10 in the following weeks.

Still, the Bucks are rolling. Tuesday’s win, a 97-81 rout of the Oklahoma City Thunder, doesn’t count in the league standings (fix that, NBA), but it was (unofficially) the Bucks’ fourth sweep. Officially, Milwaukee is 12–3 since its woeful 2–8 start. Giannis Antetokounmpo’s 26 points don’t count toward his season total (ditto, league), but his scoring (an NBA-best 32.7 points per game) and efficiency (61.4% from the floor) are career highs.

“We’ve shown that the team we started the season as is not the team we are now,” Damian Lillard said. “And that was never who we really were.”

Yeesh. It wasn’t a victory. It was a statement. A back-and-forth first half ended with the Bucks taking a one-point lead. By the end of the third quarter, it was 13. Antetokounmpo scored 12 points in the third, steamrolling past Lu Dort, Jalen Williams and every other defender Oklahoma City directed against him. Lillard chipped in eight, finishing on two of his team-high five threes in the quarter.

“There’s blunt force on offense,” Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said. “They pump fastballs and you have to be able to hit 98.”

It’s been nearly five years since Antetokounmpo won his last league MVP. After winning the tournament MVP this season, he’s on his way to another. Last season, Antetokounmpo became the first player in NBA history to shoot better than 60% in a 30 ppg season. He’s on pace to do it again in this one. His three-point shot hasn’t developed, but his mid-range game has, with Antetokounmpo adding an assortment of hooks, floaters and jumpers to his game.

“His journey to become the superstar that he is is a tough one,” Lillard said. “So when you get to this point, you don’t want to stop. You have to keep fighting for your position and where you’ve come. I think that’s who he is and that’s why he does things the way he does.”

Behind Antetokounmpo, the Bucks offense is humming. But it’s the defense that has pushed them back into the contender mix. Through 10 games, Milwaukee had a defensive rating of 115.7 per game. NBA.com. They gave up almost 116 points per game. match. Over the last 15 games, the defensive rating has improved to 110. Opponents are averaging 109.3 points per game. match. The Thunder entered the game ranked eighth in the league in offensive rating. The 82 points Oklahoma City scored was a season low.

“One of the guys, I think yesterday, said all they heard about was the other team’s defense,” coach Doc Rivers said. “That’s all they’ve heard for two days. I think it bothered guys.”

The Bucks will tell you they could see this coming. In October, after an eight-point loss to the Boston Celtics, I chatted with Lillard in his locker. “We’re going to get through this,” Lillard says confidently. A new defense deployed by assistant coach Greg Buckner took time to stick. The chemistry between Lillard and Antetokounmpo was still a work in progress. But inside the locker room in Milwaukee, the confidence never wavered.

“If we go out there and do the little things,” Lillard said. “If we play together, share the ball, make the right play, we trust our scouting report and our defensive coverages and our scheme, the more we’re able to put that possession after possession together and sustain it over 48 minutes.”

There have been adjustments. AJ Green, a three-point sniper, was given a bigger role in the rotation. Andre Jackson Jr., a defensive stopper, grabbed the starting spot opposite Lillard. And good shooters — Green, Brook Lopez, Bobby Portis — who struggled early in the season started making shots.

“I think we’re competing (now),” Antetokounmpo said. “I think we compete more. I feel like everyone understands that for us to be in a game or win a game, we have to compete more. Early this season I felt like we had this mindset just because we have a lot of talent on the team that things don’t just happen. Like guys that just want to dribble the ball up and give us the ball. I will go the other way and try to score. And that’s not what happened in the first 10 games.”

There was an NBA Finals-style celebration on the floor after the game Tuesday. But there will be no holiday after that. As he headed toward the locker room, Bucks assistant coach Darvin Ham — the two-time Cup champion Darvin Ham who managed the Lakers last season — reminded those within earshot of how far the team has to go. “We have 56 games left,” Ham said. “No one forgets that.”

In fact, Milwaukee heads to Cleveland on Friday for a conference game that is far more consequential. Inside the Bucks’ locker room, cases of Champagne remained unopened. Orders from the coaching staff. Maybe saved for another day. One that counts.

“We’re going to improve and stay locked in,” Antetokounmpo said. “Because the job isn’t done.”