"The Milwaukee Bucks, as they say, are finding ways to win.

Their ability to win on nights when maybe they shouldn't - like Monday night against the Atlanta Hawks at the Bradley Center - stems from an extremely high, yet unspoken, level of confidence that is permeating the team's locker room these days.

That confidence comes from winning.

And so, connect the dots and the result Monday was a 98-95 victory over the Hawks in a game that wasn't decided until the final minute and was one that looked as if it would result in anything but a victory for the Bucks throughout the first three quarters or so.

It was the Bucks' 15th victory in their last 17 games and their eighth straight at home. The victory came against a possible first-round playoff opponent for the Bucks, who improved their record to 39-30.

"It's just confidence," said forward Luc Richard Mbah a Moute, who played some stout defense on the Hawks' Joe Johnson on Atlanta's last couple of possessions when the game was still on the line. "We have a lot of confidence. We always feel like we can win."