Now, Brooklyn (26-43) must embark on a four-game odyssey that begins Thursday in Milwaukee against the team with the second-best record in the conference.
Thomas has certainly been doing his share to help the Nets climb back into the play-in hunt.
The shooting guard has put up at least 20 points in a career-high six consecutive games, but Brooklyn has pulled out a victory in only one of those contests, a 120-101 triumph in Cleveland on March 10.
The Nets have lost four in a row since to fall 4 1/2 lengths behind 10th-place Atlanta for the final play-in spot in the East with 14 games left on the schedule.
“We just have to go out there and do what we say up here,” Thomas insisted from the postgame podium. “Even down to me, everybody; we have to do what we say up here.”
Doing so against the Bucks (44-25) may be a tall task.
Milwaukee gave NBA-leading Boston a fight to the finish Wednesday night despite missing two-time league Most Valuable Player Giannis Antetokounmpo for the second straight game due to what the team described as a left hamstring issue.
Damian Lillard, a player the Nets flirted with bringing in last offseason, scored 32 points and Bobby Portis added 24 and 15 rebounds for Milwaukee, which nearly erased a 21-point deficit before falling short, 122-119.
There was no definitive word postgame on whether or not Antetokounmpo would be ready to go Thursday.
Regardless, Milwaukee will be shooting for a three-game season-series sweep of the Nets after edging them, 129-125, at Barclays on Nov. 6 and rolling to a 144-122 rout on the corner of Atlantic and Flatbush on Dec. 27.
Antetokounmpo piled up 68 points and 24 rebounds in those two victories, the second of which may have played a role in the eventual firing of Brooklyn coach Jacque Vaughn.
The Nets rested three starters in the…
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