Kirk Hinrich
Lebron James, Cavs Too Much for Bulls in Easy 121-98 Win
Sunday, April 25th, 2010 | Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers, LeBron James, NBA, Sports | No Comments
Lebron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers were too much on Sunday at the United Center, as the Cavs cruised to an easy 121-98 over the Bulls. Lebron James notched a triple double in the win – 37 points, 12 rebounds and 11 assists. Derrick Rose played well for the Bulls (21 points and 5 assists) as did Joakim Noah (21 points and 20 rebounds), but they did not have the help that they had in Thursday night’s impressive win over the Cavs. In that game, both Rose (37 points and 7 assists)and Noah (10 points and 15 rebounds) played well, but they also had a ton of help from Kirk Hinrich and Luol Deng.
Now it’s back to Cleveland where the Cavs will look to close out the 1st round best of 7 series. Don’t expect this one to come back to the United Center folks…
Bulls 101-93 Win Over Celtics Overshadowed by Paxson-Del Negro Melee
Wednesday, April 14th, 2010 | Boston Celtics, Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers, NBA, New York Knicks, Sports | 1 Comment
The Chicago Bulls kept their playoffs hopes alive with a big 101-93 win over the Boston Celtics at the United Center on Tuesday night. But most people weren’t talking about the win after the game – they were talking about the “alleged” rumble between Head Coach Vinny Del Negro and Vice President of Basketball Operations John Paxson (the former club GM who hired Del Negro to a 3-year deal 2 years ago). Supposedly Paxson and team management have been dismayed with Del Negro’s use of Joakim Noah down the stretch. The team has placed a “minutes-limit” on Noah to avoid further damage to his injured foot. Supposedly Paxson confronted Del Negro after the March 30th game against the Phoenix Suns in which Del Negro played Noah “too many” minutes. Allegedly, Paxson grabbed Del Negro’s tie and tried to provoke him with 2 jabs to the chest. Del Negro did not retaliate at all and assistance coach Bernie Bickerstaff had to step in to pull Paxson away. Del Negro has said that he will not comment on the confrontation and Paxson has not been able to be reached for comment. More craziness as the Bulls continue to fight for a playoff spot
Back to the game — the Bulls didn’t let a deficit heading into the 4th quarter get them down. Instead, the Bulls grabbed “themselves by the horn” as they outscored the Celtics 34-35 in the final period to win easily. Derrick Rose put forth a career night to lead his team to victory – 39 points, 7 assists and 5 rebounds. Joakim Noah turned in another amazing performance – 9 points and 16 rebounds – and he logged the most minutes (46) since returning from his foot injury. Kirk Hinrich knocked in 30 points – a season high for the veteran guard, while Luol Deng chipped in 7 points and grabbed 12 rebounds.
The win kept the Bulls a full game ahead of the Toronto Raptors for the 8th and final playoff spot in the East. If the Bulls defeat the Bobcats in Charlotte tonight, they’re in. If the Bulls lose, but the Raptors lose to the Knicks at home, then they’re also in. A Bulls loss, coupled with a Raptors win catapults Toronto into the playoffs to face the Lebron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers. Stay tuned Bulls fans — it should be a fun night indeed…
Bulls Top Cavs 109-108, Tied for 8th & Final Playoff Spot
Friday, April 9th, 2010 | Atlanta Hawks, Boston Celtics, Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers, Detroit Pistons, LeBron James, NBA, New Jersey Nets, Sports | No Comments
The Chicago Bulls picked up a HUGE win over the Cavs 109-108 on Thursday night at the United Center in Chicago. It was a hard-fought battle and despite missing key free throws down the stretch that would have iced the game, the Bulls managed to hold to beat the Lebron James-less Cavs.
Derrick Rose led the way for the Bulls with 24 points and 10 assists. Joakim Noah started and played 33+ minutes in the win – 17 points and 15 rebounds. How good is it to have the big man in the middle again? Luol Deng chipped in 22 points and 10 rebounds, while Kirk Hinrich made 8 of 12 field goal attempts and scored 23 points. It makes you wonder where this team would be if they didn’t have to play without their 3 best players – Deng, Rose and Noah – for such a long stretch in the 2nd half of the season.
Now granted, the Cavs played without Lebron James in an attempt to rest the all-star for the playoffs run. But Mo Williams answered with 35 points and 10 assists, while Antwon Jamison poured in 23 points. This is a totally different team without Lebron, but a win is a win especially when every game counts.
The Bulls pulled even with the Toronto Raptors for the 8th and final playoff spot. The Bulls play the Nets in New Jersey tonight and the Raptors in Toronto on Sunday night. Both games are must win games for the Bulls if they expect to have any chance to qualify for the post-season for the 2nd year in a row. They finish up with the Celtics at home on Tuesday night and the Bobcats on the road in Charlotte on Wednesday night. The Raptors have the Hawks in Atlanta tonight, the Bulls at home, then the Pistons on the road in Detroit on Monday and the Knicks at home on Wednesday. The Friday and Sunday games hold the key — if the Bulls can somehow win both games, they should be able to lock down that 8th seed. Otherwise, we’ll just have to hope we get lucky in the lottery again like we did when we pulled the #1 ball out of the hat to grab Derrick Rose. Keep your fingers crossed…
Bulls Start 2nd Half off with Blowout Win over Knicks
Wednesday, February 17th, 2010 | Chicago Bulls, NBA, New York Knicks, Sports | No Comments
The Chicago Bulls started off the 2nd half with a dominating 118-852 win over the New York Knicks at the United Center on Tuesday night. The Bulls outscored the Knicks in each quarter and shot over 60% from the floor for the game.
More importantly, Bulls star guard Derrick Rose led the way with 29 points, 3 rebounds and 6 assists. He made 14 of his 18 field goals and showed little adverse affects from the bruised hip he suffered in the final game before the All-Star Break. Head Coach Vinny Del Negro took no chances with the Bulls leading by so much – he limited Rose to just 27 minutes during the contest.
Luol Deng chipped in 18 points, Taj Gibson grabbed 10 boards, while Kirk Hinrich scored 14 points with 8 rebounds and 6 assists.
The Bulls got back to .500 with the win. The Bulls are in a 3-way tie for the 6-7-8 seeds in the Eastern Conference with the Charlotte Bobcats and the Miami Heat. The Bulls battle the Knicks in the home-and-home series at Madison Square Garden in New York City tonight.
Bulls Continue to Frustrate Fans with Erratic Play
Tuesday, January 26th, 2010 | Chicago Bulls, Houston Rockets, Los Angeles Lakers, NBA, New Orleans Hornets, San Antonio Spurs, Sports | No Comments
The Chicago Bulls are on a 3-game road winning streak, but they are still making life miserable for their fans in Chicago. The Bulls embarked on a 7-game road trip last week with an 18-20 record. They started off the trip with “winnable” games against the Warriors in Golden State and the Clippers in Los Angeles. The team knew that they needed to get a win or 2 right away because the back end of the trip was much more difficult with games against 5 teams with winning records.
So – after dropping the 1st 2 games against the Warriors and Clippers with lackluster performances, it looked like the Bulls might go winless on the trip. But then the improbable happened – the Bulls defeated the Suns in Phoenix, the Rockets in Houston and the Spurs in San Antonio. If the Bulls can win one more game on the road trip, they will match the total number of wins that the Bulls had on the road in the first 3 1/2 months of the NBA season – 4. Pretty incredible.
Now that they have Bulls fans believing again, I’m sure they’ll find a way to crap the bed against the Thunder in Oklahoma City and the Hornets in New Orleans to finish the road trip a “successful” 3-4.
The recent keys to success have been the dominating play of Derrick Rose and the consistent play of Luol Deng. In the last game before the road trip, Rose scored 37 points to lead the Bulls to a double-overtime win against the lowly Wizards. Since then, Rose has scored 19, 23, 32, 20 and 27 points respectively, and his average is now up to 19.6 points per game. Throw in a 5.9 assist average and a 3.7 rebound average, and you can see that Rose is getting better with each game. Rose has also limited himself to just a 2.6 turnover average on the current road trip, an excellent stat for a 2nd year player still learning the NBA game.
Luol Deng is the picture of consistency for the Bulls during the 2009-2010 NBA season. Deng is averaging 17.5 points per game and 7.9 rebounds per game. Since a November 19th loss at the Lakers in which Deng scored just 6 points, he has scored in double-digits in every game save for 3. Deng too has been limiting his turnovers and his renewed energy around the boards has Bulls fans salivating.
A final piece to the puzzle has been the consistent play of Joakim Noah. Noah is averaging 12.1 rebounds per game – a fabulous stat in and of itself. But the more telling stats are his minutes – 33:06 per game – and his scoring – 11.3 points per game. Noah has fouled out of only 1 game all season long so he is contributing crunch time and giving his coaches the ability to use him during all parts of the game.
With these 3 players proving their worth over the long NBA season so far, if I were one of the big free agents looking to make a move following the 2010 season, I would seriously consider the Bulls. Especially for a Chris Bosh or Amar’e Stoudemire, being able to play next to Noah on a nightly basis would elevate each player’s games to no limit. As long as President John Paxson and GM Gar Forman can get rid of Vinny Del Negro before the end of the season (or shortly thereafter) so that a free agent player will know that he has a legitimate NBA coach leading the way, I would think that the Bulls should be able to land one of the big free agents in the class of 2010…
Celtics a Different Team Without Kevin Garnett; Bulls Top Celtics 96-83 in Boston
Friday, January 15th, 2010 | Chicago Bulls, NBA, Sports | No Comments
The Boston Celtics are a much different (worse) team without Kevin Garnett. Last night’s 96-83 loss to the visiting Bulls clearly showed that. Now granted, the Celtics were playing their 4th game in 5 nights so the team was clearly not as energized as they typically are in front of their home crowd at the TD NorthBank Garden in Boston. But you can see how the absence of Kevin Garnett in the paint really affects the way other teams attack the Celtics on offense. With no Garnett (and no Rasheed Wallace too), Paul Pierce has to play that much harder on the defensive end of the court (not his string suit). Minutes also go up for Pierce (39+ minutes) and Ray Allen (35+ minutes). Over the course of a long NBA season, that can take its toll on the aging Celtics especially with the lack of depth on the team’s bench.
The Chicago Bulls should also be given some credit. They knew they had to attack the Celtics right from the start (as they did so many times in the epic 1st round, 7-game playoff series that the Celtics won last year). The Bulls jumped out to a 29-18 1st quarter lead and even though the Celtics continued to chip away at the lead (8 points at halftime; 7 points at the end of the 3rd quarter), the Bulls never let the Celtics get closer than 4 points in the 4th quarter. Even when that happened, the Bulls rattled off 3 straight baskets to up the lead right back up to 10 points.
It was a total team effort for the Bulls as each Bulls starter scored double digit points. Luol Deng led the way with 25 points and 4 assists. Derrick Rose overcame early foul trouble to score 17 points, grab 8 rebounds and dish out 4 assists. Joakim Noah notched his 19th double-double of the season with 15 points and 11 rebounds. Kirk Hinrich chipped in 11 points, 6 rebounds and 6 assists. Taj Gibson played through his foot injury to score 14 points and grab 6 rebounds. And in just 17 minutes off the bench, Tyrus Thomas grabbed 7 rebounds – 6 offensive – and had 4 steals.
Don’t look now, but the Bulls have won 7 of 10 games. At 17-20, they are the 8th seed in the Eastern Conference, but just 2 games out of the 5th seed in a top heavy conference. If the Bulls can somehow pull off a mid-season trade for an upper echelon player or make a run at one of the top tier free agents in the much-coveted 2010 class (Lebron James, Dwayne Wade, Chris Bosh, Amar’e Stoudemire, Joe Johnson) their could be good things to cheer about for Chicago Bulls fans in the very near future…
Chicago Bulls Off to “Good” Start
Tuesday, November 17th, 2009 | Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers, Denver Nuggets, Detroit Pistons, Los Angeles Lakers, NBA, Sports, Utah Jazz | No Comments
I guess it’s all relative, but the Chicago Bulls are clearly off to a good start during the 2009-2010 NBA schedule. It looks like the Bulls might be a part of one of the better divisions in the NBA’s Eastern Conference – the Central Division. 4 out of 5 teams in the division have winning record while the Detroit Pistons bring up the rear at .500. The Cleveland Cavaliers – winners of 7 of their last 8 games – lead the Central Division with a 7-3 record.
The Bulls defied the odds by making the playoffs right at the end of the 2008-9 NBA season – earning the 7th seed in the conference. The Bulls proved it wasn’t a fluke either, taking the Boston Celtics all the way to the brink of elimination with an exciting 7-game series in which the home team won each game.
The Bulls have picked up where they left off this season. With the departure of Ben Gordon in the off-season, but the re-emergence of Luol Deng as a legitimate NBA starter (Deng has been hampered by injuries each of the last 2 seasons), the Bulls haven’t missed a beat. The Bulls are 5-4 with a solid 4-1 home record at the United Center in Chicago. Deng leads the club with a 17.6 scoring average – his 9.2 rebounds average per game is impressive as well. Derrick Rose was hampered by a bum ankle during the pre-season, but is slowly getting back into game shape. Rose averages 13.8 points, 5.3 assists and 2.9 rebounds per game.
The biggest surprise for the Bulls has been the consistent play of Joakim Noah – 11.8 points and 12.2 rebounds per game. Talk about a huge step-up from his 6.7 and 7.6 averages from last season. Kirk Hinrich has also impressed with his solid play early in the season – 9.9 points and 4.56 assists per game. And Rookie Taj Gibson has showed some brilliant moments in limited play so far. Gibson is averaging 7.3 points per game and his 4.89 rebounding average is 3rd behind Noah and Deng on the team. 20 of his 44 rebounds have been offensive rebounds so he can clearly spark an offensive outburst during his minutes.
If the Bulls are going to make a push for a 2nd consecutive playoff appearance, they are going to need better play from John Salmons (12.6 points and 4.0 rebounds) and Brad Miller (8.2 points and 4.7 rebounds). To date, neither player has played as well as anticipated heading into the season. The Bulls are also going to have to play better on the road.
The Bulls now embark on the grueling “Circus” road trip to the west coast (as the Circus invades the United Center for 2 weeks). As mentioned above, the Bulls tend to play poorly on the road, so it will be important for the team to win at least 2 of the 6 games on the trip. It won’t be easy because trying to against the Los Angeles Lakers, Denver Nuggets, Portland Trailblazers or Utah Jazz on the road is highly unlikely. That leaves games against the Kings in Sacramento and the Bucks in Milwaukee to win. The 2 games after the circus road trip are against the Pistons at home and the Cavaliers on the road, so it doesn’t get any easier with 2 intra-division battles. At 5-4, this will be a telling 8-game stretch for the Bulls – they certainly won’t be over .500 at the end of it, but if they can win at least 3 of the games, an 8-9 record isn’t the worst thing in the world this early in the season. Head Coach Vinny Del Negro and his staff will have their work cut out for them over the next 3 weeks of the NBA schedule.
Balanced Bulls Attack Delivers 92-85 Home Opener Victory Over Spurs
Friday, October 30th, 2009 | Boston Celtics, Chicago Bulls, NBA, San Antonio Spurs, Sports | No Comments
What a great way to open the NBA season for the home town Bulls – a 92-85 victory over the San Antonio Spurs. Derrick Rose – who had missed most of the Bulls pre-season with an ankle/knee injury – started for the Bulls to delight of the sold out United Center crowd. But it was the balanced attack orchestrated by Head Coach Vinny Del Negro and delivered by the Bulls players that really made a huge impact at the UC.
Six Bulls players scored in double-digits. Luol Deng led the way with 17 points and 9 rebounds. Derrick Rose poured in 13 points while racking up 7 rebounds and 7 assists. Joakim Noah added 10 points and a team-high 10 rebounds. John Salmons scored 10 points, Tyrus Thomas scored 13 points and grabbed 6 boards, while Kirk Hinrich scored 14 points and grabbed 6 rebounds in 29 minutes off the bench. Talk about a full team effort.
What made it even more special was that it came against a good team-oriented basketball squad – the San Antonio Spurs. The Bulls shut down the Spurs playmaker Tony Parker, and although Tim Duncan still had a phenomenal night – 18 points, 16 rebounds – they made sure that no one else had a big night.
The Bulls didn’t have much time to bask in the glow of victory as the team boarded a choppy flight east right after the game to get ready for NBA Game 2 on the young season against the Celtics in Boston. The Bulls and Celtics battled in a grueling 7-game series in the 1st round of the 2009 NBA playoffs, so let’s hope there is some excitement in the air at TD Banknorth Garden in Boston on Friday night. Go Bulls!
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