His minutes have been a bit limited lately, seemingly due to some match-up issues. But at what point do match-ups become less of an issue and does it become a priority to get one of the Bucks better players on the court whenever possible. His size seems to be his biggest limitation from him ever taking another step forward. West and Hibbert were both far too big for him to be as effective as he can be on the glass.

He was unable to recapture Friday night’s magic. The jumpers did not fall. Against the Pistons, he was 9-13 from 16-23 feet. The Bucks would have loved to see such accuracy against Hibbert so he’d have to come out and contest and quit grabbing boards inside. He ceded his minutes to Sanders in the fourth.

This game was there for the taking throughout the second half of the fourth quarter. From 4:00 to 1:14 left in the fourth, Milwaukee trailed 99-96. Ellis attempted, and missed, one shot during that stretch. So much for the guy who was going to carry the Bucks at the end of games.

The numbers look fun at first glance. A near triple-double! Let’s go! But Jennings was 0-5 with a turnover in the fourth quarter. Not exactly prepping for a sequel to Reggie Miller’s documentary “Winning Time.”

He looked like he wanted to take things over in the fourth. He took three of the Bucks first four shots and attempted a pair of free throws. Crazy thing was, he missed both free throws. And he missed a tech free throw earlier. 1-4 at the stripe for Mike Dunleavy?! Crazy night. But he did a good job of going to get rebounds outside of his space throughout the fourth quarter.

Udoh has good ability as a defender, but if he’s going to be a good rotation player on a good team he has to be a better rebounder. He played center for 14 minutes and failed to grab one rebound. Meanwhile the Pacers starting front line combined for nine offensive boards.

What a very Larry Sanders game. He was actually okay and looked pretty in control of himself, of the game, of a lot of things. But things kind of got away from him late. He racked up a couple fouls and he caught a pass on the top of the key and took everyone on an adventure. He first carried, it wasn’t called, then he eventually made a pass into the tunnel under the hoop. But he lasted 25 minutes, so there’s that.

If there’s one thing Delfino has always done well as a Buck, it’s get inside Carmelo Anthony’s head. For whatever reason, the Knicks star doesn’t seem to like Milwaukee’s role playing forward. As he often has done, he drew a tech on Anthony in the fourth. Unfortunately, he was getting lit up by Anthony before that and failed to make any impact on offense. And Milwaukee missed the free throw. So that’s a bummer.

Coach Skiles said he thought Ilyasova looked really anxious. He threw away an easy pass across the court and had some foul trouble early. This isn’t a great match up for him. Does he play center and deal with Chandler? Or the power forward and guard ‘Melo? Tough spot.

Gooden played just five minutes, largely due to an injured back that’s left him looking kind of like a shell of his former self.

The game of Ellis’ Bucks career for sure. He passed well out of the pick and roll, shot well on his spot up threes and finished on his drives to the hoops. His mid-range jumper was going down too. Defensively some of his gambles paid off, but he was beat on some really simple drives at times and on J.R. Smith’s eventual game winning three, he went so far over the top that no one could recover out on Smith (H/T @DrewOlsonMKE). But he carried the Bucks through the first half, so there’s that.

He and Ellis both played very well and made some big shots, timely shots. But on the Bucks final worthwhile possession, down three with nine seconds left, he let fire on a broken play. The look wasn’t great – a 3-pointer over Tyson Chandler’s seven-foot arm. Ellis didn’t seem thrilled about what happend, but Milwaukee needed to do something. If Jennings could have worked to get it back to Ellis somehow we don’t know.

A typical of late Dunleavy shooting night and the Bucks probably take this one down. He had a great look with 43 seconds remaining that would have put the Bucks up three and probably would have gone down on another night. After grabbing his own offensive rebound, he got another look and was either blocked or altered by Carmelo Anthony. A bummer of a way to shoot given how automatic he’s been lately.

Someone had to absorb Carmelo’s body blows in the fourth. His defense was solid, and the help was generally pretty good. ‘Melo scored seven points in the fourth quarter, two of which came after a Mbah a Moute block that hit off the backboard and fell back into Anthony’s hands for a layup. The easiest of Anthony’s looks came at the hand of Delfino. Mbah a Moute was physical with him and picked him up full court when Anthony went all point forward.

Minus one grade for the hideous jump shot attempt from 15-feet in the fourth quarter that barely, if at all, drew rim on the long side.

He found himself so open around the free throw line with the ball in his hand at one point early in the fourth quarter that he had no choice but to shoot. Possibly to his surprise, he made the shot, his second bucket in the fourth. That little bit of offense was icing on the cake of another fine defensive outing from the undersized center, forced to cover a lot of Drew Gooden’s five minutes.

I tweeted at one point that this may have been Sanders’ best game ever. That was too much. My bad. He had a very good game. Sanders battled admirably with Tyson Chandler inside and even gave him a hard foul at one point much to the delight of the crowd. Sanders is playing with more edge recently, which is fun and necessary out of a backup big man. He also had two electric blocks that led to fast breaks.