Giannis Antetokounmpo notches a formidable triple-double to guide the Bucks to the 2024 Emirates NBA Cup.
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LAS VEGAS – The trophy had come an hour earlier, Most Valuable Player of the Emirates NBA Cup Championship, and it sat as a proud, silent assertion in entrance of an elated Giannis Antetokounmpo whereas he spoke with reporters.
Then the query took place that trophy and, to his credit score, the Bucks star didn’t default to the straightforward reply.
Does that award go to one of the best participant, or does it signify the chief of the crew that wins?
Antetokounmpo was lined both manner, thoughts you. He had steered the Bucks to a 7-0 mark in Group and Knockout Round video games, capping it Tuesday evening at T-Mobile Arena with a radical 97-81 thumping of the tenacious Oklahoma City Thunder.
Individually, he was terrific with a triple-double — 26 factors, 19 rebounds, 10 assists — that included three blocks and a pair of steals. So profitable the MVP unanimously may have been about his stats and his dominance, interval.
It’s inconceivable, although, that Milwaukee may have dusted itself off after a 2-8 begin and navigated by means of its present 13-3 run with out Antetokounmpo exhibiting the way in which.
“The Greek Freak” merely may have stated “each” to the double-barreled query. Or he may have gone with the management half, extra palatable than the inherent boast of being finest.
Instead, he contemplated it, and peeled again extra layers.
Giannis Antetokounmpo, the #EmiratesNBACup MVP! pic.twitter.com/dsiwReEHrc
— NBA (@NBA) December 18, 2024
“When you strategy a sport like this, you’re not serious about MVPs. You’re serious about attempting to win the sport,” Antetokounmpo stated. “And generally while you attempt to do no matter it takes, you place your self in place to achieve success and also you’re in a position to get a trophy like that.
“I don’t know why I obtained the MVP. I’m comfortable that I obtained it. I don’t take it as a right. I’m most comfortable we obtained to win the sport. Some of my teammates obtained life-changing cash.”
Members of the profitable crew every obtained roughly $514,000 for the title sport (with two-way gamers on the roster’s fringe getting half that quantity). Antetokounmpo shared that one of many Bucks’ two-way gamers, middle Liam Robbins, a local of Davenport, Iowa, turned a poster youngster of types for the additional Cup money.
“We had this joke throughout the crew about Liam, that I promised him from the primary Cup sport, I stated ‘We’re going to go all the way in which and we’re going to get you a home in Iowa,’” Antetokounmpo stated. “So after each sport, I’m like, ‘Hey, one step nearer to your own home in Iowa.’
“After the sport, I went to the locker room and I noticed smiles on their faces.”
“Everybody obtained $500,000 proper?!” 🤑 pic.twitter.com/zQru6oBZ7O
— Milwaukee Bucks (@Bucks) December 18, 2024
Giannis says his cash from profitable the #EmiratesNBACup is already gone 😂 pic.twitter.com/d2ZrZcBNrl
— NBA (@NBA) December 18, 2024
The Bucks’ star joins the Los Angeles Lakers’ LeBron James because the MVPs of the 2 Cup editions. James received the inaugural trophy final December and, like Antetokounmpo, took the occasion, the competitors, the prize cash and the person honor severely from the beginning.
Antetokounmpo did the identical, circling the Cup title at the beginning of Group play. It was a dedication the NBA absolutely appreciated, given the still-developing significance of the fledgling competitors. It was a spotlight the Bucks wanted to resuscitate their season.
“I don’t suppose you possibly can flush [the poor start],” Milwaukee teammate Damian Lillard stated, “however we’ve proven the crew we began the season as is just not the crew that we at the moment are, and it was by no means who we really had been.”
Of Antetokounmpo, with whom his on-court chemistry has improved significantly, Lillard added: “I don’t suppose the Cup [or the MVP] was one thing that Giannis was simply decided to win. I believe that’s simply who he’s. Just the background that he comes from. His journey to turning into the famous person that he’s, is a troublesome one.
“So while you get up to now, you don’t wish to cease.”
Coach Doc Rivers, who hadn’t but been employed by the Bucks once they obtained bounced final 12 months by Indiana within the Cup semifinal spherical, was requested how a lot working with Antetokounmpo weighed in his choice to come back off the TV sideline final winter. On a proverbial scale of 1 to 10.
“I imply, a ten, proper?” Rivers stated after the sport. “To coach a Giannis, to teach a Dame, to see that group, a veteran group, it’s a tremendous alternative for a coach. This group permits you to coach them, they actually do.
“They allow you to coach them onerous. Nobody takes something private. I even stated it final 12 months, it was like teaching grownups, if you already know what I imply. They get that you must inform them the reality and so they deal with it.”
Doc Rivers and Giannis Antetokounmpo share their ideas following Milwaukee’s conquest of Oklahoma City within the Emirates NBA Cup Championship.
The MVP competitors on Tuesday was arrange as a star vs. star scenario among the many two Cup finalists. Had OKC received, guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander seemingly would have claimed the award. With the Bucks profitable, Antetokounmpo was the straightforward alternative (with some wiggle room if Lillard had exploded offensively).
The Cup title and its MVP add to Antetokounmpo’s resume already full of accolades: Eight-time All-Star and All-NBA, five-time All-Defensive crew, Most Improved Player in 2017, Defensive Player of the Year in 2020, consecutive Kia NBA MVP awards in 2019 and 2020, All-Star Game MVP in 2021, Finals MVP that very same 12 months and a spot on the NBA Top 75 anniversary crew introduced two years in the past.
That’s a protracted journey for the thin child from Athens, Greece, constructed like a Tootsie Pop, on whom the Bucks gambled the No. 15 choose in 2013. In that point, Antetokounmpo has cobbled collectively a Hall of Fame legacy.
And the factor is, he by no means appeared happier — as comfortable, certain, however not happier — than he did Tuesday.
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Steve Aschburner has written concerning the NBA since 1980. You can e-mail him right here, discover his archive right here and follow him on X.
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