Bucks' Holiday, Lopez named NBA All-Defensive 1st Team

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Brook Lopez and Jrue Holiday (Photo by Megan Briggs/Getty Images)

MILWAUKEE - Milwaukee Bucks guard Jrue Holiday and center Brook Lopez have been named to the 2022-23 NBA All-Defensive First Team, the league announced Tuesday.

Holiday received 94 first-team votes and four second-team votes, while Lopez earned 85 first-team votes and 11 second-team votes. The Kia All-Defensive Team was selected by a global panel of 100 sportswriters and broadcasters.

Holiday has now earned All-Defensive team honors in each of his three seasons with the Bucks, while overall this is the fifth time in the last six seasons he has been named All-Defense.

Previously, Holday earned first team honors following the 2017-18 and 2020-21 seasons and second team honors after the 2018-19 and 2021-22 seasons. This season, Holiday led the Bucks in both steals per game (1.2) and total steals (79), helping Milwaukee finish with the fourth-best defensive rating in the league.

A finalist for Defensive Player of the Year, Lopez led the league in total blocks this season with a career-high 193 and finished third in the NBA in blocks per game with a career-high 2.49. In his 15th season in the NBA, Lopez logged an NBA-high six games with 6+ blocks, including a career-high, and league-high for the 2022-23 season, nine blocks on March 9 against. Brooklyn. Overall, Lopez swatted away multiple shots in 51 of his 78 games played this season and also led the league in contested shots with 1,362 – nearly 450 more than the next-closest player who had 917.

This is the first time Lopez has earned All-Defensive First Team honors in his career and the second time he has been named All-Defense after earning second team honors following the 2019-20 season.

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Cleveland Cavaliers forward Evan Mobley and Chicago Bulls guard Alex Caruso rounded out the All-NBA Defensive First Team.

Boston guard Derrick White topped the second team, followed by eight-time All-Defensive selection Draymond Green of Golden State. Toronto's O.G. Anunoby, Dillon Brooks of Memphis and Bam Adebayo of Miami rounded out the team.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.