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Box Score
Yes, the Bucks lost. Yes, they blew a big lead as the Wizards outscored Milwaukee 41-26 in the second behind a solid 18 point effort from third overall pick Bradley Beal.
And no, the result doesn't really matter.
What does matter? Positive performances from the Bucks' 2011 and 2012 draft picks, with Tobias Harris building on his nice effort on Monday with an even more impressive 24 points (10/20 fg, 0/1 threes, 4/5 ft) and 12 rebounds and 14th overall pick John Henson debuting with an encouraging 20 points (8/17 fg) and nine rebounds in 35 minutes. Doron Lamb was somewhat quieter (6/13 fg, 12 pts), while Larry Sanders halved his foul total from Monday (10 to five!) but was again overly aggressive and generally underwhelming.
Harris started slowly (1/5 fg early) but was terrific in the middle quarters on his way to sinking 11 of his final 15 shots against a more than capable defender in Chris Singleton. Harris once again did most of his damage going to the rack and with his in-between game, the highlight coming on a vicious slam in the second half. Despite having just turned 20, Harris has looked like a man in Vegas: the doughy kid playing power forward at Tennessee has given way to a svelter, stronger and more assertive guy who looks determined to earn regular minutes in Scott Skiles' small forward rotation. I still worry a bit about his off-the-ball game limiting his abilities as a complementary player, but as a featured option in summer league there's not much to complain about. And yes, he is still barely 20.
Be sure to check out Steve's detailed review of Henson's debut, which started with a 20-foot jumper and also featured a nifty baseline drop step on the way to 10 points in the first six minutes. He slowed down thereafter--coming off a bout with the flu that's probably not surprising--but he looked the part of an NBA player and showed good activity levels on both ends. While Henson figures to earn a living on the defensive end early on, he seemed to be a half step slow with his rotations tonight as the Wiz managed to finish a number of times in spite of Henson's excellent length. Nothing to worry about, though, as he generally seems to have good positional awareness and moved well on both ends.
You can't help but wonder whether Henson may already be leaping past Sanders in Scott Skiles' completely hypothetical rotation, but we should probably give it at least a week of pseudo-pro basketball before trying to draw any broad conclusions. Sanders' penchant for trying to block everything again saw him rack up too many fouls, but there's no debating his disruptive abilities on that end. I'm not sure yet if Henson can steal minutes at center the way Sanders can, but hopefully by the end of the week we'll have a better idea. For more on the game: