Kasparas Jakučionis goes 11-for-11 at the line after early foul trouble: ‘It wasn’t the smartest move from me’

MILWAUKEE — Oct. 14, 2026 — Kasparas Jakučionis spent most of the first half of the Bucks’ 125-104 preseason loss to Chicago on the bench, with four fouls before halftime. In the second half he was the Bucks’ best playmaker. The second-year guard finished with 18 points, six assists and a steal in 20 minutes, and he made all 11 of his free throws.

Jakučionis shot only 3-of-8 from the field and 1-of-5 from three. He also had five turnovers and five fouls, and he was minus-5. Fourteen of his 18 points came after halftime.

He picked up his first two fouls in the opening 76 seconds, a shooting foul and then one that Bucks coach Taylor Jenkins said came “94 feet from the basket,” and went to the bench. He fouled again less than three minutes into the second quarter and once more not long after he returned. Jenkins said the Bucks kept “putting our hand in the cookie jar” against Chicago, something the staff had singled out in its scouting before the game.

‘It wasn’t the smartest move from me’

Jakučionis did not argue with the whistles.

“I would say it wasn’t the smartest move from me. But I’m an aggressive player,” he said. “I always played that way, and it was a little bit weird, because usually you get away with these calls because you just be aggressive over and over, so they cannot call everything. But I think the preseason is to figure out some stuff, too. So you just got to be smarter for the next time.”

He said the fouls also cost him his rhythm. “The rhythm is hard to find when you play one minute in first quarter and a couple minutes in second quarter,” he said. “It’s hard to find the rhythm, for sure.”

He also made clear he was not going to change how he plays. “I’ll definitely not be passive now, just because I got some fouls,” Jakučionis said. “I feel like I’m here for give my all out in the court every time. So I’ll do the same, just be a little bit smarter.”

The third quarter

He opened the second half with a driving floater and a free throw for a three-point play, then stole a Josh Giddey pass on the next possession. He added two more free throws, set up Ousmane Dieng for a three and late in the quarter made a 24-foot three off a Kam Jones pass and a short basket. He then found Jones for two threes from 26 feet in the final minute of the quarter. Jakučionis scored 10 points in the third and assisted on three threes.

Jenkins liked what he saw. “That’s going to be when Cass is at his greatest is when he’s full throttle both sides of the floor,” the coach said. He called the first foul “a 50-50 call potentially” and said the second was one the guard could have avoided. He said Jakučionis came back in the second half “getting downhill, playing in space, playing off the pick and rolls, playing through contact, driving and kicking.” Overall, Jenkins said, “he’ll calibrate as he gets going.”

‘Way far from where we should be’

Jakučionis was blunt about the team. Milwaukee committed 30 turnovers, and Chicago scored 43 points off them.

“I would say we’re way far from where we should be and where we could be as a team,” he said. “The transition defense was really bad in all the games we played so far. That’s why we’re trying to work on practices, try to put a lot more attention on that aspect.” He still liked the way the group handles its mistakes. “We don’t let it slide,” he said. “We always show on the film, we address it.”

Why it matters

The 6-foot-5 Lithuanian came to Milwaukee from Miami in the Giannis Antetokounmpo trade. The Heat took him No. 20 in the 2025 draft, and Bucks general manager Jon Horst said in July that the deal would not have happened without him. “There was not a deal that we would have done that didn’t have each of these four players in it, including Kasparas,” Horst told reporters at Summer League, describing him as “a true point guard.”

At Oklahoma City last week, he scored 10 points with four assists in 18 minutes. On Wednesday he got to the line again and again and kept the ball moving. The next step is doing that while staying on the floor. The Bucks finish the preseason at Indiana on Friday.