Giannis Antetokounmpo gets revenge on Pacers with buzzer-beater

With 0.6 seconds left in Monday night's game, Antetokounmpo made a fallaway jumper to give the Milwaukee Bucks a 117-115 win over the Pacers. It's Milwaukee's fourth win in its last five regular-season games against Indiana, but the Pacers have knocked the Bucks out of the playoffs the last two seasons.

Giannis Antetokounmpo has developed a strong rivalry with the Pacers

The rivalry between Antetokounmpo's Bucks and the Pacers really started during the 2023-24 season, when the Pacers won four of their five matchups with the Bucks, including a win in the semifinals of the NBA Cup. They went on to beat the Bucks in the first round of the playoffs, a series Antetokounmpo missed with a calf strain.

It's not just that the Pacers pushed their Central Division rivals for the first time in years. It's that the games were chippy, with a number of dramatic moments. In the Bucks' lone win, Antetokounmpo scored 64 points, then charged into the Pacers locker room to retrieve the game ball.

Last season, Tyrese Haliburton stunned the Bucks by converting a four-point play to beat them in the regular season. In the playoffs, Haliburton drove past Antetokounmpo for a game-winning basket in overtime that ended the Bucks' season.

The Pacers have haunted Giannis Antetokounmpo

Last season, Antetokounmpo told reporters that he thought about losing to the Pacers all the time, even when he was "about to get freaky at night."

It's not that Antetokounmpo has played badly, either. He averaged 30 points, 12.3 rebounds and 7.5 assists, shooting 64.9%. In the playoffs, he upped his production to 33 PPG, 15.4 rebounds and 6.6 assists. But the Bucks lost, again, which must have made Monday's 33 points on 14-for-21 shooting and 15 rebounds all the sweeter. Especially after he ended the game with a clutch basket over a Pacers double-team.

With Haliburton and others injured, the Pacers don't look like a threat this year. falling to 1-6 with the loss. But one long-term change is that the Bucks now have longtime Pacers center Myles Turner manning the middle. Monday, Turner had more blocks (five) than the Pacers entire team (four).

He also booed the Indiana fans who booed him throughout the night.

This may be a lost season for the Pacers, and a make-or-break season for the Bucks, who want to convince Antetokounmpo to sign another extension next summer. But in one of the NBA's most entertaining new rivalries, Antetokounmpo finally has a buzzer-beater of his own.