The Milwaukee Bucks have been like a roller coaster ride at Six Flags Great America. Their level of play has been up and down and no one really knows where this team may be headed. The Bucks have been the kind of team where you don’t know what to expect from them.

The rest of December provides the tough challenges, mainly on the road, and some lesser opponents that the Bucks have struggled with up to this point in the season.

The Bucks got off to a slow start with a 2-4 record. Once that bumpy stretch was over the Bucks followed it up with a five-game winning streak.

After the short period of success they then had a four-game losing streak. For the rest of this month there are plenty of challenges out there for the Bucks that may tell you where the team is going to finish in April.

To be a consistent winner, the Bucks must first start with winning at least half of the remaining road games left in this month. Those five road opponents are going to be like climbing a mountain. The team heads to Boston, Cleveland, Denver, Chicago and Detroit.

The Bucks, to their credit, have handled the better teams to this point in the season like Dallas, Los Angeles and Cleveland. However, having to face five possible playoff teams in just over two weeks may decide the Bucks' fate. To stay in the hunt they must try to win at least two of these games.

Beating high quality opponents may eventually build their confidence and prevent them from letting the foot off the gas pedal when they play lesser teams coming up at home, like Minnesota, Sacramento and Charlotte.

They also must realize that every game is important and if you don’t take care of the lesser teams it may come back to haunt you when you are battling for a playoff spot in April.

The road woes up to this point have been the major reason why this team is off to an average start. They opened the season at 1-6 on the road. With five more road games left in the month they have to focus and build some road confidence.

Playoff teams who split their games on the road and winning at the rate the Bucks do on the road will find themselves in last place at season's end.

One of the other reasons why you must pay attention to how they do this month is that around late December and into early January last year, the Bucks started their season-long collapse that resulted in a 28-54 season.

Having to play catch-up in February, March and April may be too much to overcome for this young Bucks squad. A young team depends a lot on confidence, and finding themselves a considerable number of games under the .500 mark when the New Year rolls in may be too much to get past.

The goal in December is to split the games against the high quality opponents and win the majority of the home games.

If they do those things you might see a more consistent team that doesn’t take any of their opponents lightly no matter how good they are. This month also could be disaster with the amount of playoff-caliber teams on the schedule, so if the Bucks lose almost every one of those games they will be in store for another long season.

Hopefully, as December winds down, we should finally know who the real Bucks are for the remainder of the season.

> Comments