“I want us to put our name on it”: Bucks coach Doc Rivers accepts the challenge of winning the NBA Cup

LAS VEGAS — Doc Rivers — part Baptist preacher, part disgruntled coach — held back as he talked about the simplicity of basketball and the simplicity of this NBA Cup.

“I’m not going to get on the soapbox,” Rivers said Saturday. “But I just think, and they will blame this generation, but I try not to do that, but accept the challenge. We often run away from challenges.”

By “we,” the Milwaukee Bucks coach didn’t mean his team specifically, but rather the basketball culture as a whole. In many ways, players have become too cool to try, and so something as physically and emotionally demanding as putting oneself on display is seen as a black mark, a reason to ridicule players. In some quarters, perhaps in small but loud corners of the basketball discussion, “trying hard” is ridiculed.

That’s why the Milwaukee Bucks advanced past the Atlanta Hawks into the NBA Cup Finals on Tuesday night in Las Vegas, and perhaps why Warriors coach Steve Kerr was so dismayed by the ridiculous decision at the end of the K His team’s first-round loss to the Houston Rockets on Wednesday.

Both coaches weren’t afraid to give it their all, even though this isn’t a playoff series or game and that can be easily forgotten by the All-Star break when the regular season really gets going comes, but it is highly competitive and should be invested in.

“Let’s get our name out there,” Rivers said. “We will try to win it. If we don’t win it, we don’t win it, but… there’s nothing wrong with saying you want to win something, and if you win it, that’s great, and you don’t win it, at least you have it tried .”

It’s a sentiment that carries through the playoffs and competitive games, but not on a Tuesday night in December when the field isn’t a monstrosity and just a regular old logo.

Yahoo Sports caught up with Rivers shortly after he wrapped up his press conference Saturday night to get him to elaborate on those comments.

“Last year I thought a lot of teams said, ‘Yeah, I don’t know (about the Cup).’ This year I like it because more teams are saying, ‘We want to win it.'” When you lose, you’re like, “Oh well (that doesn’t matter).” I don’t want that problem. I want us to put our names on it.”

It sounds like a fear of failure that seems to contradict everything the players were wired to do before reaching this level. But it exists.

“Yes, absolutely. If you don’t say it and it doesn’t happen, nobody says anything,” Rivers continued. “I just think that you can’t approach competition, you have to accept it and embrace it and want it. And if you can do that, you have a chance to win it.”

The teams that hold themselves to that standard are ultimately the ones that win, he said. When the word “accountability” came up, Rivers became excited.

“That’s the right word,” Rivers said. “When you do that, responsibility comes into play, and that’s a good thing.”

That’s what the NBA needed for this four-day outing. More than they needed Steph or LeBron — even though it seems harder to find LeBron than Waldo or Carmen Sandiego at this point — because the NBA isn’t lacking in star power.

We know who the actors are, and in some cases they are simply overexposed by the way modern media works. And of course the NBA needs to have a contingency plan for the day when LeBron retires or Steph might leave not far behind him, but that’s not why the NBA Cup exists.

Star power helps here, but the four teams made it to Las Vegas because winning is their top priority and the uncompromising competitive spirit has become part of their DNA. Rockets coach Ime Udoka doesn’t give quarters or effs, and that message is echoed by Dillon Brooks, Amen Thompson and Tari Eason, as well as throughout the roster. The Oklahoma City Thunder, even when they were losing a lot of games, were still a team you couldn’t just drop by for a casual evening.

The Atlanta Hawks and Bucks delivered an entertaining and competitive 48 minutes in the first semifinal, and that’s what the NBA world needed to see. Giannis Antetokounmpo was bouncing around the floor for loose balls, and it felt like there was more at stake.

The Bucks have needed that competitive fire for a while, and after a year of struggling with coaching changes and a rough start to the season, they’re in much better shape now. Bobby Portis is a face of that fire.

“Not only do we take constructive criticism from our coaches, but we police ourselves,” Portis told Yahoo Sports. “I think this is the biggest turnaround in our season, man, us coming together and checking ourselves. As a player, you know when you’re not doing something right. You know when you don’t put in that much effort, like, ‘Hey, bro, come on.’ Hold each other accountable and play with joy.”

This is Portis’ fuel, and he has learned when to use it and when to release it. Even though his skills have developed in his 10th year, he knows he’s in the league because he brings something special to the locker room.

He was never too cool to compete, too cool to care.

“It’s a little difficult because I’ve always been a guy that wore his heart on his sleeve,” Portis said. “I never let the mistakes affect my performance. I always try hard. You can be an energy giver or an energy taker, and I always give something to the team.”

That gets through and allows you to call out teammates when that effort isn’t reciprocated. Just like last year, when Adrian Griffin was coaching, he called out his team and asked for more.

He had the capital, and it took him a few years to realize he could do it. And while it was received that way from the outside, it was clear that some level of truth was needed in the locker room.

The NBA doesn’t actually have a competition problem, but rather a perception problem. The perception that it takes a tournament to produce more than the usual moves, the perception that the players don’t care as much as the players of past eras.

Fighting cool is probably the easiest answer.