There’s that truism that pretty much everyone in the Midwest understands. You party hard in Indianapolis, and when you do everyone knows you’re going to go overtime and you’re in no shape for much of anything the next day.
And the Bulls predictably weren’t Thursday during their 126-111 hangover against the Los Angeles Clippers.
“At times,” Bulls coach Billy Donovan acknowledged, “scoring was a bit of a struggle for us.”
Which surely complicates things in the NBA where adding up the baskets is most important to everyone.
The Clippers did so with much more ease, shooting 60% overall and making 20-of-40 threes in a game they pretty much dominated throughout. The Clippers got ahead by 14 points in the first quarter with Paul George and Kawhi Leonard combing to make 11 of their first 12 field goal attempts, led by 11 at the end of the first quarter and the half, and then 92-80 going into the fourth quarter.
The Bulls probably should have stopped at White Castle on the way back last night. Yeah, that always works.
Donovan to start the fourth then took a shot with his jumbo lineup of Nikola Vučević and Andre Drummond, and for moments it appeared to be a shot of inspiration. The Bulls got their deficit down to 98-90 with a pair of threes and eight consecutive points from here-he-goes-again DeMar DeRozan.
DeRozan led the Bulls with 21 points. But waves of traps and an assortment of defenders coming at DeRozan denied him of any miracles after his did-you-see-that overtime performance to beat the Pacers Wednesday. He had to be tired after that and did commit five turnovers amidst the crowd of Clippers defenders.
Vučević finished with 19 points and Alex Caruso had five more threes again for 17 points. The Bulls were actually very good on their own threes, 16-of-35 for 46%. Drummond had 15 points and seven rebounds in 16 minutes.
But after that Bulls scare, the Clippers returned Leonard to the game and Drummond never could get out close enough to deny wide open Clippers shooters. George made another three, and Drummond was leaving Bones Hyland. He was starting for the injured James Harden. Hyland made a couple of easy passes for scores and then made his own shot mostly undefended and Donovan had to go back to emergency starter Torrey Craig.
The Clippers by then with about five minutes left in the game were pretty much out of range with a 113-99 lead they pushed again up to 20 before two-way player Henri Drell got a chance to score his first NBA basket.
The Windy City guys were recruited with the absence of Coby White, who suffered that hip injury late in the Indiana game the Bulls initially feared was much worse. He’s not expected to miss much time, though he missed his first game of the season Wednesday. The Bulls also were without rookie Julian Phillips with a foot issue.
“It's probably going to be when he can start to feel comfortable to get back to playing," Donovan said about Coby's status. "The imaging came back relatively clean. He is dealing with discomfort and soreness. So it's just a matter of how quickly and soon he can get over that.”
Which perhaps was enough relief to consider the loss secondary.
“I’m very happy it was nothing serious,” added Vučević. “It looked ugly and I definitely was worried. Losing Coby is a big loss for us, not only his scoring but his presence because the defense has to focus on him so much; he is a big part of what we do.”
Which made it three starters from opening day out with Zach LaVine and Patrick Williams already gone for the season with injuries.
“Without Coby, Patrick and Zach, the other guys have had to step it up, so at times we are fighting for consistency,” said Donovan. “We’ve got to find that consistency. We miss those guys. I liked the way guys competed. It was a hard game after last night we got into overtime, but Indiana (last night) also was on a back-to-back. It’s what we all signed up for. Next man up. I feel there is enough there in the locker room where we can be better and compete. We just didn’t make enough plays. I did think the guys really, really competed and gave us everything they have against a team that shot the ball incredibly well tonight.”
That wasn’t necessarily on the Bulls, though it’s nice to have All-Stars in Leonard and George who this season have decided to play. Even the often recalcitrant Leonard, who left the previous Clippers game with back spasms, came back to play, which few have seen in recent seasons. He had 27 points and George mostly at point guard for Harden had 28.
And, yes, as good as Caruso is, those guys just easily shoot over him.
So even with Craig, a higher level defender, substituting in the starting lineup for White, the Bulls had to devote traps, help defenders and double teams to Leonard and at times George. The result was the Clippers leisurely swinging the ball around the perimeter or across court, usually to the left corner, where it looked like the money ball rack of the three-point contest.
Hyland made four threes, Normal Powell and Amir Coffey off the bench each dropped in three, and George’s smooth arc of excellence bent toward the netting and barely a ripple on a six-pack of threes.
“With (George’s) length and size he's a hard guy to contest,” Donovan admitted. “Both those guys have the ability to play over you and shooting the ball they were incredibly efficient. The attention you’re giving to PG and Kawhi, Norman Powell or or some other guys get going, so hey, you’ve got to live with some of that. And to their credit they stepped up and made some shots. The first half we turned it over 10 times, so I thought we really dug ourselves a hole going into the half. It’s hard for us to play Kawhi and Paul one on one, and sometimes we have to bring help and I thought they did a good job getting off of it and the rotations maybe we could have done better. That happens sometimes when you try to get the ball out of those guys hands; you leave yourself vulnerable if the ball is swung to someone else.”
The Clippers swung, and they didn’t miss (the nets) much.
The Bulls record dropped to 32-35.
So close to .500 and yet so far in this Sisyphean season.
For those of you unable to find much of Greek mythology on TikTok, the clock continues to tick on the Bulls season long effort to reach .500. In Greek mythology, which I guess in modern times is akin to the Disney app for appropriate moral allegories, Sisyphus was a bad man who killed to show off his power. This angered the gods, if not also the families. So the gods, who were sort of the angry podcasters of today, were able to enforce a tidy punishment by forcing Sisyphus to roll an immense boulder up a hill constantly. Only for it to roll back down every time it neared the top, repeating this action forever.
Albert Camus, a famous French depressive, interpreted this as the inevitable struggle about the meaningless and absurdity of life.
Though shifted to basketball, as me and Thibs like to do with pretty much everything, it sort of has defined the Bulls of late constantly pushing that .500 bounder and relentlessly having it flatten them.
I know, quite the tortured analogy, but we all let DeRozan get away with his.
“We never really could find a way to put stops together consistently,” said Vučević. “The position we put ourselves in with the bad (5-14) start, we definitely dug ourselves a hole and (have been) trying to find a way to claw our way back out of it. It is frustrating that a couple of times we got to one under .500 and never have been able to win that one game and get there. But the same time we’re not gonna stop fighting to get there, and we’re going to continue to fight and climb up the standings
“It is one thing with the team that we never stop fighting and never stop competing. It’s a tricky spot we are in,” agreed Vučević, “but we will continue to fight.”
Just one more push, one more push; we think they can, we think they can, they know they can, they know they can.
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