By Tim Gutowski Published Mar 26, 2002 at 5:17 AM

The day before the Bucks acquired Anthony Mason prior to the season last fall, I wrote a column talking about the team's chances for 2002 success entitled, "With or Without You." Obviously, it should have been just "Without You." {INSERT_RELATED}

Though never fully sold on Mason's ability to get the Bucks to the next level, neither did I think he could take last year's progress and reverse it. And, no, Mason might not be the root of all the Bucks' season-long ills, but he is certainly the most overt symbol of a long year.

In fact, it's far too easy to blame only Mason. Sure, he doesn't handle the ball as well as he thinks he does (watch him dribble up the floor the next time he gets a defensive board and feels the need), and he both stymies the team's quick-flow offense and invariably touches the ball when the team absolutely needs a hoop (Coach Karl? Um, can Anthony please sit out the next time we have a do-or-die possession inside the last minute?). Still, he can hardly take all the blame for a (thus far) 37-31 campaign that has been as inspiring as watching cows graze.

What happened to the old run n' gun Bucks? You know, the Big Three? The points per game might still be there, but the spirit certainly isn't.

Perhaps most dispiriting is that an open road once beckoned toward the NBA Finals. Kudos to Byron Scott and his surprising Nets, but are they the best team in the conference? (And when I say conference, I'm talking about an NBA conference.) When a team goes from out of the playoffs to top of the heap, a couple groups in between must have aided in the transition.

An abundance of turnovers, laughable perimeter defense and a simple lack of pride (defined by losing twice to Cleveland ... at home ... after the All-Star break) are just a couple symptoms of a Milwaukee season gone awry. If you don't believe me, just listen to the Bucks themselves:

Mason after a February loss to the Bulls: "If we were a less talented team, I'd have nothing to say ... We just have to be better in those areas of hustle to win."

Michael Redd after a loss the next game to Cleveland: "They had a great night, but we can't give them looks like that. It's our fault."

Glenn Robinson after a loss the next game to Miami: "It seems like when you're not playing well, things like tonight (the infamous missed double-dribble call game) seem to happen to you."

Ray Allen after another loss at home to Cleveland: "Teams come in here and they're juiced to play us and they beat us because we start playing too late. We're not good enough to not respect other teams."

Allen after losing last week in New Jersey: "It was defense. They turned up the heat and we didn't respond."

Karl after the blowout loss at home to Sacramento: "When we didn't make our shots early, we lost our confidence out there. That's kind of been our Achilles' heel this year."

Sam Cassell after the same game: "We were just in a funk out there. We've been in a funk for a few weeks now."

Funk, indeed. But why? Why has this team, seemingly so talented and on the verge -- and with every conceivable opportunity -- consistently dribbled the ball off its collective toe? After all, the Bucks were supposedly going to cruise in the talent-challenged East.

It didn't happen. For over two months now, Milwaukee has been half snake-bitten, half back-biting. There were last-second shots (Miami, Portland, and San Antonio) and baffling losses to inferior foes (the Knicks three times, others too numerous to mention). During the last 60 days, there have been almost no key victories, and every game the Bucks might have lost, they did. Now, instead of trying to catch the Nets or even stave off a game Detroit team in the Central, Milwaukee is simply holding on to a playoff berth with both hands.

Once again: why?

Expectations, perhaps. Milwaukee hadn't won a playoff series in 12 years before it won two and came ever-so-close to a third last spring. Logically, the next step was the Finals. Sure, there were teams that could derail their chances, but Allen Iverson and Aaron McKie fought injuries in Philly, Grant Hill missed another year in Orlando and Toronto collapsed like the Taliban after Jan. 1.

But still the losses came fast and furious after mid-January, a time during which, I should add, the team has been basically healthy. Cassell might have a toe injury, Allen's knee might still be sore and Tim Thomas may have various aches and pains, but Hill, Iverson and Vince Carter have missed serious time with far worse wounds. The Bucks cannot blame their troubles on injury.

Instead, I think the Bucks forget how they did all those great things in the first place. They didn't do them by talking to Ahmad Rashad, or by being omnipresent on various ESPN-delivered media (Allen), or by getting ticketed for great things in November. They did it by playing four or five consecutive months of solid basketball -- not a mere two and a half months followed by cruise control after Jan. 15.

Karl's repartee with an Esquire writer which hit the press a few weeks ago was more than just delectable timing -- it was simply another episode of mouths over matter.

And even though the losses mount, the still the team talks.

"The stage is still set for this to turn into a wonderful thing. It could be a great story. Start off good. Go down to the bottom. Run off a streak," Mason told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel last week.

Anthony, I think it's nearly time to start talking about next year.

Quotes for this article were obtained from Ticker wire reports.

Sports shots columnist Tim Gutowski was born in a hospital in West Allis and his sporting heart never really left. He grew up in a tiny town 30 miles west of the city named Genesee and was in attendance at County Stadium the day the Brewers clinched the 1981 second-half AL East crown. I bet you can't say that.

Though Tim moved away from Wisconsin (to Iowa and eventually the suburbs of Chicago) as a 10-year-old, he eventually found his way back to Milwaukee. He remembers fondly the pre-Web days of listenting to static-filled Brewers games on AM 620 and crying after repeated Bears' victories over the Packers.