Chicago Bulls 100 at New Jersey Nets 87
December 30th, 2008 by Andrew WamboldtThe Chicago Bulls defeated the New Jersey Nets 100 to 87 at the IZOD Center in East Rutherford, New Jersey.
The Bulls opened up a 15 point lead in the first quarter, but as usual, let the Nets get back in the game. In the fourth quarter, the game was tied 86 to 86. From there, the Bulls went on a 14-0 run and sailed to victory.
During the 14 point run, Gordon hit two threes that served as the daggers in the game.
Derrick Rose was the Bulls’ best player tonight, leading the Bulls to victory. Rose finished with 21 points, 13 assists, 4 rebounds, and 2 steals. Rose completely controlled the tempo of the game tonight and found the open man. Rose took notice of the Nets porous defense and drove to the rim at will.
Ben Gordon, as usual was great. Gordon finished with 24 points, 4 rebounds, and 2 assists. Ben Gordon is just great as usual. He takes over a bit in the first half to keep the Bulls from flopping. In the second half, he defers to Rose and lets Rose do his damage, but still comes back to make two clutch threes late in the fourth. What’s not to love? Regardless of whether Gordon gets the designation of being an allstar, Gordon has clearly arrived as a star player in the NBA. He isn’t a superstar, but by now, it should be clear that he is a star.
The Nets opposing duo also played well. Devin Harris had 26 points and 5 assists and Vince Carter had 31 points. Unfortunately for those two, the rest of their team isn’t very good at all. Brooke Lopez was solid, scoring 9 points and 8 rebounds, but his help defense was poor, allowing for Rose to have a big game driving to the basket. Outside of those three, the Nets got basically no other contributions.
Larry Hughes and Andres Nocioni contributed nicely, hitting some shots for the Bulls. Both players scored 17 points.
The Bulls big men were really good. Aaron Gray put in solid defense, as did Tyrus Thomas. Joakim Noah came off the bench and showed a lot of energy. Noah finished with 8 points, 7 rebounds, and 4 blocks. Despite his high block total, Noah’s interior defense was still very suspect.
This is the Bulls first road win outside of the circus trip. The Bulls snapped a 7 game road losing streak, and 3 game overall losing streak with tonight’s victory.
With the win, the Buls improve to 14-17 on the season.
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Tags: Aaron Gray, Andres Nocioni, Ben Gordon, Brooke Lopez, Chicago Bulls, Derrick Rose, Devin harris, Joakim Noah, Larry Hughes, New Jersey Nets, Tyrus Thomas, Vince Carter
