The Milwaukee Bucks and Miami Heat enter the playoffs on opposite ends of the spectrum. Miami finished the season with a 66-16 record, the best in the NBA. Milwaukee was 38-44, the worst record among postseason qualifiers.

The Heat’s big three of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh have been surrounded by players who are asked to perform in a specific role – from Ray Allen’s 3-point shooting (41.9 percent at age 37) to Shane Battier’s versatile defense. Everyone plays their part and lets the big three, specifically LeBron James, do the heavy lifting.

How do the Bucks compete with that? While an NBA assistant coach recently agreed that Milwaukee has a tall task in front of them, he also listed a few areas where the Bucks could excel and shared his perspective on the series.

The following is a summary of my conversation with that assistant coach – who spoke on the condition of anonymity - about the Bucks and Heat playoff series.

Milwaukee’s strength
The Bucks can score on Miami. Wade isn’t what he once was on defense and he has to guard someone. More than likely, that will be Monta Ellis or J.J. Redick. We know what Wade is capable of on offense, but the Bucks should make him work on D and cause some problems for the Heat on that end of the floor.

Look for the Bucks to use their depth in this series. Milwaukee’s bench is an underrated group that allows the team to play in different ways. Two lineups to consider are Larry Sanders surrounded by shooters and a small lineup moving Ersan Ilyasova to the center position.

Surrounding Sanders with shooters spreads the floor on offense, which could lead to offensive rebounding opportunities for him. Overall, the idea is to get the most from the shooters on offense and have Sanders there to help cover up weaknesses on D.

Playing Ersan Ilyasova at the center position gives the Bucks a shooter from that spot and also spreads the floor. Ilyasova is unique because 6-foot, 10-inch players who shoot 44.4 percent from 3-point range (fourth in the NBA) aren’t common. This lineup would play fast and have lots of shooters on the floor.

Ilyasova’s name came up a few times in the conversation. He could create issues defensively for Miami and force them to use LeBron James to cover him.

Miami’s weakness
Miami isn’t known for their rebounding. They finished last in the NBA in rebounds per game, so it’s nice to know that a 66-win team isn’t entirely perfect!

Our coach was surprised to see the Heat handle the Bucks pretty easily on the glass during the regular season. Miami outrebounded Milwaukee in three of the four games.

Still, it’s an area where the Heat are vulnerable and the Bucks should be able to take advantage of, both in terms of their personnel and also how they game plan. Milwaukee finished the season second in offensive rebounds, so keep an eye on that.

Milwaukee’s Defense
It’s obvious that James, Wade and Bosh all present problems. (Jim Owczarski covered the challenge of guarding James yesterday). 

 However, if you want a shot at beating the Heat, Shane Battier, Mario Chalmers and Udonis Haslem better not be making their shots. During last season’s championship run, all three were making offensive contributions, making the team that much tougher to beat.

Miami’s defense
One of my favorite phrases from the NBA is "you are what you defend." It means that, no matter how big a player is or what he does on offense, if he can defend a point guard, shooting guard, small forward and power forward, he could play any of those positions and force the other team to match up with him on the offensive end.

The Heat are led defensively by James and Battier. Not only are they good defenders, they cover multiple positions and it gives Miami freedom in their lineups.

The talent of that Heat duo is part of the reason why they switch on "pick and pops" (do a quick Internet search if you’re not sure what that play is). It takes athletic players to do that and Miami can get away with it against most teams.

Enter the Bucks, who run the pick and pop with Brandon Jennings/Ellis plus Ilyasova (we’ll say Ellis from here on, but it could be either player or even Redick). It’s a situation where Milwaukee could force Miami into bad matchups.

If Miami stays with their regular season strategy, when Ilyasova sets a pick for Ellis and pops out for a shot, Ilyasova’s defender would then cover Ellis. The Ellis defender moves to Ilyasova.

More than likely the person covering Ellis wouldn’t be fast enough to keep up, so it could lead to an easy basket for him or the Heat defense would compromise and allow someone else to be left open.

The other issue is that a smaller guard would be defending Ilyasova. That leaves Ilyasova space to get open and shoot over a smaller player. Normally, a 6-10 player isn’t a threat to shoot from that space, but it’s something Miami has to consider because of Ilyasova’s shooting ability.

If Miami changes their defense, they could try to trap the ball handler (Ellis) and force him into a turnover. It’s risky, because it leaves Ilyasova open or, if someone else rotates to Ilyasova, a pass is made to someone like Redick or Mike Dunleavy, who has a good look and is a capable shooter.

Miami’s defense in these situations is one of the first things our coach will look for. He’s curious to see how it plays out and if Milwaukee can use it to their advantage.

What to do?
The coach could see the Bucks winning one or two games because they can score. Milwaukee has the potential to put up 110 points on any given night, but the question is how much do they give up on D to score those points?

Will the Bucks try to outscore the Heat or will they try to be physical and grind the game out? The danger of trying to go big and physical is Miami can always go smaller and quicker because LeBron James is so versatile.

Here’s the plan
In games one and two, our coach would try to grind out the games and be physical with the Heat. The atmosphere will be tense and it’ll be more difficult to play free and loose in that environment, especially since it can be difficult to get calls in an opponent’s building.

When the teams visit Cream City, he said the Bucks can play small and fast. They’ll get better whistles from the referees and the Bradley Center is an old building that gets really loud. That’s a perfect atmosphere to play loose and score a lot of points.

He added that Milwaukee could play a lot of ways. The Bucks have good players, but not necessarily a group that fits well together. It’ll force personnel decisions in the offseason, but in the meantime it gives the coaching staff freedom to explore lineups.

We’ll see what directions the Bucks take in this series. We know what we’re going to get from the Heat. 

Adam Rose is a lifelong Milwaukeean an is currently a copywriter for a marketing after working seven years in the NBA.