Bulls out-hustle Celtics for win in Boston

By Couper Moorhead, for NBA.com
Posted Friday January 15, 2010 12:12AM

BOSTON (NBA.com exclusive) -- The largest talking point during last season's playoffs was that the Boston Celtics were missing Kevin Garnett, even with the Chicago Bulls taking them to seven games in the first round of the playoffs.

But it was the missing player whose name was hardly mentioned that made all the difference in the Bulls 96-83 victory as they handed Boston its second consecutive home loss.

Thursday night, efficiency arrived in a package labeled Luol Deng, who was nothing short of fantastic on every part of the floor. Where last season the Bulls had to put the much shorter Kirk Hinrich on Paul Pierce, Deng hounded Pierce all evening, using his length to induce a 6-for-18 performance from his mark.

"He's about as good as it gets without being an All-Star," Pierce said.

Deng was even better on offense, scoring 25 points on 13 shots while getting to the line 10 times. The Bulls shoot the most 16-23 footers in the entire league, but Deng worked inside-out, getting himself going early on with a couple floaters in the paint before working the mid-range game.

The Celtics have struggled all year with long and athletic teams -- like the Atlanta Hawks -- and tonight was no exception. Poor passing and slow recognition in box-out and secondary help situations didn't help, but the Bulls had all the energy where the Celtics were flat. Chicago finished with 15 offensive boards, nine steals, 10 blocked shots, 50 total rebounds and forced 18 turnovers out of their opponents.

"They just played with more effort than us," Kendrick Perkins said. "I don't think our communication tonight was where it needed to be for us on the defensive end."

Despite those numbers, the Celtics had a foot in the door until the final minutes. Trailing by eight at the half, Boston made its move in the third quarter, but every time the lead shrunk to five or six, the Bulls had an answer and the Celtics could not push any run further than a couple minutes.

"We played mostly in spurts," Pierce said. "We'd make a run . . . and then it was just like our energy went away."

"The warning sign came in the third quarter," Boston coach Doc Rivers said. "We tried to make a push right out of the box and within two, three minutes we couldn't sustain."

And then there was shooting 15-of-28 at the charity stripe, which was the final, miserable verse to Boston's evening.

The Bulls have been far from the best team in the league at holding leads -- having blown a 35-point margin to Sacramento less than a month ago -- but there was little slippage in their win.

"It's probably the most complete game we've played all year with controlling it," Derrick Rose said. "That's something we've been working on."

Rose was the primary reason for that control, showing poise in recovering from an off night and driving the lane to score nine points with four assists in the fourth quarter. And despite scoring just two more points, with fewer dimes, Rose clearly got the best of Rajon Rondo, adding an exclamation point with 1:48 to play when he burned Rondo with a lightning-quick crossover and a right-to-left finish at the rim.

"I knew that to get it going I just gotta force myself being aggressive attacking the basket, taking shots they were giving me," Rose said.

The last time the Celtics played the Bulls, on December 12 in Chicago, the Bulls shot the worst percentage of shots at the rim (30.6) of any team this season (stat courtesy Hoopdata.com), and lost by 26. But that was when the Celtics had the height and length of Garnett and Rasheed Wallace. Without them, Chicago attacked the rim at will, finishing with 48 points in the paint to go with the aforementioned work on the offensive glass.

Boston could have played the tired fatigue angle after the game, having played four games in five nights and the day before in New Jersey, but Rivers took the high road.

"We got our butt kicked tonight, in every fashion," Rivers said. "I'd rather give the credit to the Bulls."

• Bulls: James
• Celtics: Daniels, Garnett

• Bulls: --
• Celtics: --

• Lead Changes: 1
• Times Tied: 3

• Arena: TD Garden, Boston, MA
• Officials: #10 Ron Garretson, #45 Joe Forte, #64 Eli Roe
• Attendance: 18624
• Duration: 2:32