Bucks @ Hawks Game 4 Predictions: Take Bucks with the points with hobbled Young

Will Bucks be able to keep up efficient late-game stretches as they did in Game 3...?

The Atlanta Hawks looked to be in good position to take Game 3 in Atlanta Sunday evening.

They had done a good job at holding everyone except Giannis Antetokounmpo below their season averages up until the fourth quarter.

That’s when Khris Middleton made his mark. After facing a lot of scrutiny from fans after some of his shooting performances in the Brooklyn series, Middleton was out to quiet all of the haters. Giannis took a back seat, as it was appear Middleton was hot.

He went on to score 20 points in just the fourth quarter, including four three-pointers. The biggest shot of them all came on a turnaround from the baseline that seemed it had no prayer of going in, just to go through the bottom of the net.

It was also incredibly unfortunate that Trae Young got hurt the way he did. Atlanta sports teams have seemingly not been able to catch a break when their team is on the cusp of accomplishing something great, just for it to come crumbling down. That’s exactly what was going through everyone in Atlanta’s head when Young landed on the referees ankle.

Young attempted to come back, and looked okay for the first few minutes, but clearly wasn’t the superhuman player the Hawks had in the first two rounds.

With the Hawks as a 7-point underdog for Game 4, Young is expected to play, though his effectiveness is still unclear.

In addition to Young’s injury, the Hawks really miss the typical production from Bogdan Bogdanovic, who is battling through an injury of his own. He shot 3-for-16 and 2-for-10 from three in Game 3. There have been no signs that he will turn it around anytime soon. Kevin Huerter has stepped up, and the Hawks got a good game out of Danilo Gallinari, but that still wasn’t enough.

It was such a good game from Middleton that nobody realized Jrue Holiday didn’t capitalize at all on Trae being out, scoring just six points.

One player that has helped Milwaukee tremendously is Bobby Portis. After scoring a game-high six points before not playing the last three games in the Brooklyn series, Portis is averaging 11 points and five rebounds per game off the bench for the Bucks.

The Hawks are depleted and almost out of gas. It was bad enough that they’ve been relying on Huerter as a second or third scoring option, but now with a hobbled Trae Young, I’ll take Milwaukee -7 tonight.

I have two props for us tonight, one on each side.

First, I like Giannis over 5.5 assists. He had just four in Game 3, but had nine in Game 1 and 6 in Game 2. This is the ideal method for the Bucks. We’ve seen Giannis sometimes struggle late in games, so if guys like Middleton continue to step up in the fourth quarter, I think he’ll be able to find open teammates and defer when he has to.

The second prop is John Collins over 9.5 rebounds. Collins has been a rebounding machine and his ability to read shots and get offensive rebounds makes it so this prop is almost always in play.