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Giannis Antetokounmpo drops career-high 64 points over Pacers, then tensions rise over game ball

Bobby Portis was tossed in the fourth quarter while trying to defend Antetokounmpo after a hard foul

Ryan Young
Staff writer
·6 min read
220

Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Milwaukee Bucks got their revenge on the Indiana Pacers after the NBA’s in-season tournament.

The game, however, got very heated on Wednesday night at Fiserv Forum — and a brief altercation broke out after it ended over who got to keep the game ball.

Antetokounmpo dropped a career-high 64 points while leading the Bucks past the Pacers 140-126. That set a franchise record for the Bucks, surpassing Michael Redd’s previous record of 57 from 2006, and marked the first 60-point game in the league this season. The win came after the Pacers beat the Bucks in the semifinals of the in-season tournament in Las Vegas last week.

Antetokounmpo had 14 rebounds, shot 20-of-28 from the field and went 24-of-32 from the free-throw line, which set a career high for attempts at the stripe. He had 26 of his points in the fourth quarter, too, and came back in to make a layup, a pair of free throws and a late dunk to put the Pacers away when they went on a small run late after it seemed like Antetokounmpo and the rest of the starters would be done for the night.

“He’s an unstoppable player,” Bucks coach Adrian Griffin said after the game, via Bally Sports. “You can’t guard him one-on-one, and we’ve got some really good guys surrounding him, but at the end of the day, it’s all him. His talent, his ability, his will, he has an incredible will to win and he’ll do whatever it takes to win … Just wow, what a performance.”

Antetokounmpo is now responsible for two of the top three single-game scoring records in Bucks history, both of which came in 2023. Wednesday was the third 50-point game he’s had against the Pacers in his career.

Damian Lillard, who had the last two 60-point games in the league when he was with the Portland Trail Blazers, added 21 points and five assists for Milwaukee on Wednesday. Khris Middleton added 11 points, nine rebounds and seven assists.

Tyrese Haliburton led the Pacers with 22 points and seven assists after shooting 8-of-16 from the field, and Myles Turner finished with 22 points and nine rebounds. Those two were the only Pacers starters to score in double figures.

Giannis Antetokounmpo put up a franchise record 64 points in Milwaukee’s revenge game after their loss to the Pacers in the in-season tournament. (AP/Morry Gash)
Giannis Antetokounmpo put up a franchise-record 64 points in Milwaukee’s revenge game after their loss to the Pacers in the in-season tournament. (AP/Morry Gash)

Bobby Portis ejected during game, then tensions rise reportedly over game ball late

While Antetokounmpo was having his career night, tensions boiled over multiple times. First, in the fourth quarter, Bucks forward Bobby Portis was ejected after he stepped in to defend Antetokounmpo.

Antetokounmpo drove to the rim early in the final period when Pacers forward Aaron Nesmith grabbed him and threw him to the ground in the lane. The play didn’t look intentional, but rather as if it got away from Nesmith after he fell for a shot fake.

But before Nesmith and Antetokounmpo could separate, Portis came flying in trying to shove Nesmith. That sparked a small altercation that required the two players being separated. Antetokounmpo’s younger brother, Thanasis, lost it on the bench, too, and had to be held back.

Both Portis and Nesmith were hit with flagrant fouls in the incident, as was Obi Toppin, and Portis was ejected for his flagrant 2. Portis finished with 19 points after shooting 8-of-13 from the field in 23 minutes.

Things erupted after the game ended, too, when the Pacers apparently took the game ball and left for the locker room. Antetokounmpo was seen yelling at Haliburton and others before he and his brother took off down the tunnel, where a separate incident had broken out. Eventually, the elder Antetokounmpo returned to the court and gave a normal interview with Bally Sports Wisconsin.

Griffin said after the game he wasn’t aware of what happened during that postgame incident, but he planned to look into it. According to Bleacher Report's Chris Haynes, the Pacers took the game ball to give it to rookie Oscar Tshiebwe, who scored his first regular-season career points on Wednesday.

Bucks security later retrieved the ball — well, a ball — for Antetokounmpo.

“I have a ball, but I don’t know if it’s the game ball,” Antetokounmpo said. “It doesn’t feel like the game ball to me, it feels like a brand new ball. I can tell. I played 35 minutes today, I know how the game ball felt … I’ve never seen this before.”

Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said the incident was "unfortunate," and there was simply a "misunderstanding about the game ball." Carlisle also said Pacers general manager Chad Buchanan was elbowed in the ribs during the altercation.

"We were not thinking about Giannis' franchise record, so we grabbed the ball," he said, via FieldhouseFiles' Scott Agness.

Tshiebwe scored in the in-season tournament championship game, though that game didn't count toward regular-season stats.

“They took the game ball, and that type of stuff happens in the NBA when people get offended by how it happened … They did something like that,” Lillard said. “They took the ball and said, 'Our rookie scored his first NBA points when this dude just scored 60.' But that’s part of the league, the gamesmanship. That’s the pettiness. It happens. I didn’t think it was that deep, but it just turned into a lot of commotion and a lot of stuff.”

While it was a very tense matchup in what has been a great rivalry in the Eastern Conference already this season, Antetokounmpo managed to pull off the historic outing and get the win. The two teams will square off in a pair of matchups on Jan. 1 and Jan. 3, which are sure to be just as competitive.