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Budenholzer is the coach of the Bucks.
The jury acquitted Kyle Rittenhouse of all charges. The time is 0:25.
The organization would continue to fight for better after a jury found Kyle Rittenhouse guilty of killing two men and wounding another during protests in Wisconsin last year, according to Milwaukee Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer.
The NBA's playoff bubble in Orlando was just days after a white police officer shot a black man in August 2020 and one day after Rittenhouse shot three people in the protests that followed.
Budenholzer was going to have a conversation with the team before the game.
Budenholzer said before the game that he was trying to push for better in the country. Hope for improvement. Continue to fight for social justice. Continue to fight for better, but at the same time, have to abide by the jury's decision.
Rittenhouse had been charged with murder, attempted murder, and reckless endangering after he shot Gaige Grosskreutz and two other people with a semi-automatic rifle during a night of protests.
Rittenhouse, who is white, pleaded self-defense. He could have been sentenced to life in prison if he was found guilty of first-degree murder.
The jury that deliberated for 312 days appeared to be overwhelmingly white.
In January, the Milwaukee Bucks and Detroit Pistons both knelt on the court for seven seconds after tip-off, following a decision by a Wisconsin prosecutor to not file charges against a police officer who shot a man. The number of seconds was in line with the number of times the man was shot.
Budenholzer didn't say how much the Bucks had been watching the trial.
Budenholzer said that it was very close to the Jacob Blake case and the connection to everything that happened while we were in the bubble.
Budenholzer's comments of pushing for better were echoed by other coaches.
Police presence had been increased outside of the arena in case of a protest.
Nets coach Steve Nash said that it's important for people to continue to fight for the type of justice and equality that serves all. There has to be a path forward, even though it raises a lot of eyebrows, questions, and pain.
I think the movement that we've experienced, one way or the other, is pushing change because it can't be, 'well this is just the way it is.' Even if you can't see that change on a daily basis or even year by year, without that type of attention and will to fight for a brighter future, I think there would be no change. These are opportunities for us to look in the mirror.
Warriors coach Steve Kerr voiced his concerns about gun laws before the game.
The charge of possession of a dangerous weapon by a person under the age of 18 had appeared likely to lead to a conviction for Rittenhouse. The judge threw out the charge after the defense argued that the Wisconsin law did not apply to the rifle Rittenhouse used.
"The fact that we are seemingly OK with a teenager's right to take an assault rifle into an area where there is civil unrest, that's really scary and concerning," Kerr said. This is where we have gun laws. We have to have safer gun laws in place to protect ourselves and each other.
It wasn't a shocking verdict, but one that poses great risk if we continue to go down this path of open carry and states that people can carry weapons of war. This is America. It was a dangerous path.
The Associated Press and Brian Windhorst contributed to the report.
