{"id":1310635,"date":"2019-05-23T23:16:00","date_gmt":"2019-05-24T05:16:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/leonard-scores-35-raptors-beat-bucks-105-99-for-3-2-lead\/"},"modified":"2019-05-23T23:16:00","modified_gmt":"2019-05-24T05:16:00","slug":"leonard-scores-35-raptors-beat-bucks-105-99-for-3-2-lead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/leonard-scores-35-raptors-beat-bucks-105-99-for-3-2-lead\/","title":{"rendered":"Leonard scores 35, Raptors beat Bucks 105-99 for 3-2 lead"},"content":{"rendered":"
Toronto Raptors’ Kawhi Leonard shoots past Milwaukee Bucks’ Brook Lopez during the second half of Game 5 of the NBA Eastern Conference basketball playoff finals Thursday, May 23, 2019, in Milwaukee. The Raptors won 105-99 to take a 3-2 lead in the series. (AP Photo\/Morry Gash)<\/strong>
AP | AP<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MILWAUKEE \u2014 Kawhi Leonard arrived in Toronto thinking he could pick up another championship to go with the one he already has.<\/p>\n

One more victory and he\u2019ll play for another ring. And dominant performances like he put up Thursday night are a big reason why.<\/p>\n

Leonard scored 35 points and the Raptors beat the Milwaukee Bucks 105-99 to take a 3-2 lead in the Eastern Conference finals.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not afraid of the moment,\u201d Leonard said. \u201cThis is what I work out for in the summer. I\u2019m just trying to win. It\u2019s a matter of me being aggressive and don\u2019t shy away from anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leonard was the NBA Finals MVP when San Antonio won the championship in 2014. And he\u2019s capping off his first season in Toronto after requesting a trade from the Spurs with quite a playoff run.<\/p>\n

It includes the first buzzer-beater to win a Game 7 \u2014 a shot that took four bounces off the rim to knock out Philadelphia in the conference semifinals. And he has continued to dominate in the conference finals.<\/p>\n

Leonard showed no obvious signs of the leg soreness that bothered him in Toronto\u2019s victories in the previous two games, hitting the 30-point mark for the fourth time in the series. He had a career-high nine assists, made five 3-pointers and grabbed seven rebounds.<\/p>\n

New father Fred VanVleet scored 21 points, hitting seven 3s. Kyle Lowry added 17 as the Raptors put themselves in position to advance to the NBA Finals for the first time. A victory at home Saturday would set up a matchup with two-time defending champion Golden State.<\/p>\n

The Raptors battled out of an early 14-point hole, then got 15 points from Leonard in the fourth quarter to send the top-seeded Bucks to their first three-game losing streak of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe has been unbelievable in the playoffs with the Spurs as well,\u201d Raptors coach Nick Nurse said. \u201cI can only say that he\u2019s been really good. He gets stronger as the fourth wears on. He wants the ball and he wants to make the plays and he seems to be making the right plays. You\u2019re almost shocked when he pulls up at 15 feet and it doesn\u2019t go in. He\u2019s playing at both ends.\u201d<\/p>\n

Giannis Antetokounmpo had 24 points for Milwaukee hours after being announced as a unanimous first-team, All-NBA selection.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not going to fold,\u201d he said. \u201cCome on, man. Best team in the league, man. We\u2019re not going to fold. We\u2019re going to go in and give it everything we\u2019ve got. We can\u2019t fold. We\u2019re going to come back to Milwaukee being (ticked).\u201d<\/p>\n

Eric Bledsoe scored 20 and Malcolm Brogdon added 18 points and 11 rebounds in his return to the starting lineup.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s first to four. We\u2019ve got to go to Toronto, get a game. I think the group will be ready,\u201d Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer said.<\/p>\n

The Raptors were clinging to a two-point lead in the closing minute after Khris Middleton drove around Leonard on the baseline for a layup.<\/p>\n

Toronto was initially called for a shot-clock violation when Leonard missed a fadeaway jumper with 35 seconds left. That got overturned by a replay review, and Brook Lopez was called for a foul, instead, for bumping Marc Gasol after he retrieved the loose ball.<\/p>\n

Gasol hit both free throws to make it 100-97. Another replay review went in Toronto\u2019s favor when officials determined a ball went out of bounds off Brogdon with 26.8 seconds left. Brogdon pulled his hand away, thinking his dribble had gone off Pascal Siakam\u2019s foot.<\/p>\n

Siakam then drove for a dunk, making it 102-97, and the Raptors hung on from there.<\/p>\n

Milwaukee was leading 81-79 with about 8 1\/2 minutes left when Leonard nailed back-to-back 3-pointers. He hit two free throws before Siakam threw down a put-back dunk to make it 89-81.<\/p>\n

The Bucks tied it at 93-all with 2:44 left on a 3-pointer by Lopez. VanVleet answered with one of his own before Antetokounmpo threw down an alley-oop dunk to cut it to 96-95 with just over two minutes remaining.<\/p>\n

He was subbed out with 1:12 left in the game after twisting his ankle, but checked back in with 35 seconds to go.<\/p>\n

BREW CREW<\/p>\n

Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers got sucked into a beer chugging contest, and it didn\u2019t go that well for him.<\/p>\n

Teammate David Bakhtiari had no trouble downing three cups when he was shown on the video board. The camera panned to Rodgers and he could only finish about half of one, drawing scorn from some fans.<\/p>\n

Brewers star Christian Yelich had no trouble chugging one later in the game.<\/p>\n

TIP-INS<\/p>\n

Raptors: Lowry has 1,126 points in 66 playoff games for Toronto, surpassing DeMar DeRozan (1,117) as the franchise\u2019s postseason scoring leader.<\/p>\n

Bucks: Brogdon started all 64 games he played in during the regular season, before missing basically all of the first two rounds because of a heel injury. With Brogdon back in the lineup, Nikola Mirotic came off the bench.<\/p>\n

UP NEXT<\/p>\n

Game 6 is at Toronto on Saturday.<\/p>\n

via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Toronto Raptors’ Kawhi Leonard shoots past Milwaukee Bucks’ Brook Lopez during the second half of Game 5 of the NBA Eastern Conference basketball playoff finals Thursday, May 23, 2019, in Milwaukee. The Raptors won 105-99 to take a 3-2 lead in the series. (AP Photo\/Morry Gash)AP | AP MILWAUKEE \u2014 Kawhi Leonard arrived in Toronto […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1310635","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-17 22:34:54","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1310635"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310635\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1310635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1310635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1310635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}