"It's on me," Antetokounmpo said. "As I said, I had open shots, but they wasn't my shots, so I didn't feel comfortable to take them. I think my teammates did a great job finding me, but come the next game, in Game 6, I got to be more aggressive, make more plays because definitely my teammates need me."

The Bucks head into Thursday's game down 3-2 in the series and know they must do a better job finding more ways for Antetokounmpo to find success.

"We all have to take responsibility in that -- finding different spots to put him in," Bucks interim head coach Joe Prunty said. "I think Giannis is one of the most aggressive drivers in the game, trying to get downhill. I think he gets bodied quite a bit. What I'm concerned about [is] how much they're pushing. I want him to keep attacking regardless of how physical the game may be. But in the grand scheme of things, I would just say it's on all of us. I've got to help find him better opportunities for shots. We have to make sure he's getting the ball, but I want to make sure for us we got a quality possession every time. We've got multiple guys that are capable of knocking shots down. I don't want it to turn into, 'Hey, we have to do this for Giannis.'"

Antetokounmpo finished just 5-for-10 from the field, and the 10 field goal attempts were the fourth-most on the Bucks. His two total drives and one shot in transition were the fewest he had in any game throughout this series, according to ESPN Stats & Information. He had 21 assist opportunities compared with an average of nine in Games 1-4.

"I feel like the shots I had, the moments in the game, that they were quality shots, so I took them," Antetokounmpo said. "In Game 6, I got to come out being more aggressive. I still tried to make plays, tried to put my teammates in the right spot. I was just trying to be aggressive."

Celtics big man Semi Ojeleye was tasked with staying in front of Antetokounmpo throughout the night, but it was a team effort, as Celtics coach Brad Stevens repeatedly threw bodies at the 23-year-old star.

"Giannis is a heckuva player," Stevens said. "You're not going to be perfect against him. You're not going to hold him down by any means. He makes plays for other people. He's very unselfish, if he's not the one scoring. But we just felt like we needed a little bit more ball pressure overall, and so that was the decision to go smaller. Semi is a guy who has been a versatile defender for us all year, and that's a tall task -- to ask a guy to guard Giannis the whole night."

Stevens' message to Ojeleye was pretty simple.

"Just try to make it tough on Giannis as a scorer," Ojeleye said. "He's a tough player and a tough matchup for a lot of guys. Just trying to make it as tough as possible. He made a lot of tough shots. ... He's a great player, and I just tried to stay in front and make him take tough shots -- try to be physical."

Antetokounmpo acknowledged the Celtics' defense and the problems it caused for him throughout the night, but he remained steadfast in feeling that it was on him to make the right changes heading into Game 6.

"I'm not going to take anything away from any player," Antetokounmpo said. "I could easily say it was on me. I didn't feel like -- it was not just Semi Ojeleye, it was everybody guarding me. But he did a great job. He played hard. He competed for his team, and hopefully he can do the same thing in Game 6."