Giannis Antetokounmpo: I invited Monty Williams into Bucks locker room for speech

The NBA Finals yielded an awesome moment of sportsmanship: Defeated Suns coach Monty Williams went into the Bucks’ locker room to congratulate them.

That drew criticism from Amin Elhassan, who viewed Monty Williams’ gesture as “too look at me.”

But apparently Giannis Antetokounmpo invited Williams into the locker room.

Malika Andrews of ESPN:

From the cutting room floor of our @SportsCenter convo: Giannis discusses this moment Suns coach Monty Williams. “I had the people stop the music and stop the champagne… I told him, ‘I feel like there's a good chance we might running back next year.’ More: https://t.co/GizGXOyuPj pic.twitter.com/YjuFhbDES7

— Malika Andrews (@malika_andrews) July 23, 2021

Antetokounmpo:

It was an amazing moment. He came up to me and told me, “Congrats.” And he’s a great coach. He got the best out of this team.

I felt like the right thing to do was to take him into the locker room and allow him to talk to the team. Because I think he wanted to talk to the team, but he didn’t want to stop the celebration.

Did you invite him?

Antetokounmpo:

Yes. I walked in with him in the locker room. So, I had the people stop the music and stop the champagne. And he was able to talk to the team and congratulate us. We congratulate him, too, and wish him luck. And I told him, I said, “I feel like there’s a good chance we might run it back next year.” He has a great team, and we have a great team.

So, now this is cool by both Williams and Antetokounmpo.