Greek Freak continuing to make history

c/o NBA Entertainment

Giannis Antetokounmpo's ascent towards greatness continues.

The Bucks escaped with a 109-103 victory at the Fiserv Forum, highlighted by a spectacular denial by the Greek of a Deandre Ayton attempted slam with 74 seconds left in the game.

It capped off an amazing all-round performance for Giannis, as he finished with 26 points, fourteen rebounds, eight assists, three steals, and a couple of blocks in almost 43 minutes of play.

Earlier in the series, he became the fourth player and first non-American to pull off multiple 40-point and 10-rebound performances in a single NBA Finals, and just one other person pulled off that feat in consecutive games. Coming into Game 4, only three players have scored more points that he did (103 points) in their first three NBA Finals games: Rick Barry (122 in 1967), Allen Iverson (106 in 2001), and Willis Reed (104 in 1970).

Other notable aspects of Giannis' Finals performance so far sees him becoming the third player to pull off a 41-13-6 line, joining Magic and LeBron. And if we expand that line to 40-10-5, he is the sixth player in this century to achieve it, and the only one to do that with just a turnover.

The Greek is already a larger-than-life figure, as he generates almost 23 million engagement on his official Instagram account (giannis_an34). Only LeBron, Steph, and Damian have larger levels of engagement. In addition, content that is tailored around him produces 131 million views across the league's social media platforms this postseason.

In his home country of Greece, the Bucks were involved in three of the top five NBA games viewed on NBA League Pass. Subscriptions to NBA LP have increased 34 percent since the start of the postseason, and compared to last season, there is an eleven percent increase of viewership for Bucks' games.

Having two of the three Antetokounmpo brothers in the league has its dividends, with Bucks being the top choice of 65 percent of LP's Team Pass subscribers.

Stars like Giannis and this season's Most Valuable Player Nikola Jokic have once again reaffirmed that basketball is the global game.

The NBA Finals is reaching fans in 215 countries and territories, doing so in 59 languages. Milwaukee and Phoenix have a combined seven international players from six countries (Giannis and Thanasis Antetokounmpo of Greece, Mamadi Diakite of Guinea, and Axel Toupane of France for the Bucks, and Deandre Ayton of Bahamas, Abdel Nader of Egypt, and Dario Šarić of Croatia for Phoenix).