With one and half minutes in the game the Bulls were up by 5, and were on their way for victories.  The Mavericks had other plans.  Jose Barea drove on Kirk Hinrich and scooped in a layup for his 20th point of the game, making it a 95 to 92 game.  Rose missed a jumpshot, the Bulls fouled Nowitzki, who made two free throws to make it a 95 to 94 game.

Next trip down the floor, Rose nails a nice floater to give the Bulls a three point lead.  Unfortunately, Rose would then give up three points to the Mavericks.  Rose was out of position defensively, leaving Jason Kidd wide open for three.  Kidd sunk the three.

As usual, the Bulls called their end play for Derrick Rose.  He drove to the basket and did a fall away floater trying to get it over Nowitzki.  Bulls fans thought that Rose was fouled on there by an undercut, but that was not the case.  After Rose came down, he just caught himself on Brandon Bass’s foot and tripped.  No foul.

I don’t like what Rose did on this play.  Dirk caught himself in no man’s land, with his feet within the semi-circle.  Rose should have just went into Dirk and forced the foul, instead of fading away.  Not only did Rose make his shot more difficult, but he assured that he would not get the foul call.

The play call was also questionable by Vinny.  He should have went to Ben Gordon, who had Jose Barea guarding him.  That’s a matchup you have to take advantage of.  In addition, I don’t like how Vinny had Ben just stand in the corner.  That makes for some easy deny defense on Gordon for the Mavericks.  If you are going to go to Rose, have Ben run around like he is trying to get open and be an actual decoy on the play.  Ben and standing in the corner has never been a successful formula.

In overtime, it was all Dirk Nowitki.  Nowitzki scored 14 points in the overtime period, and answered everytime the Bulls scored.  Nowitzki was the definition of clutch tonight.

The Bulls made a mini run to try to end the overtime.  Nocioni made a 3 to make it a 3 point game.  Nowitzki responded with 2 free throws.  Then Tyrus Thomas made a 3 pointer to bring it within 2.  Nowitzki responded with 2 free throws.  Then Ben Gordon made a three pointer at the buzzer to make it a one point game.  Unfotunately the Mavericks didn’t follow Eric Gordon’s lead, and foul Ben Gordon on a three pointer to allow the chance for a 4 point game to bring the game into overtime.  And with that, the Bulls fell 115 to 114 in overtime to the Dallas Mavericks.

Dirk Nowitzki was a monster tonight, scoring 43 points, grabbing 9 rebounds, and blocking 3 shots.  He actually started the game shooting poorly, but he was deadly down the stretch.

Ben Gordon led the Bulls in scoring with 28 points.  He had an alright game.  His scoring was nice, and he had a good game for the most part, but he had some really bad moments.  The first of which was letting Antoine Wright score an easy 4 points to start the game, which prompted Del Negro to bring Kirk Hinrich into the game just about 2 minutes in.  This wasn’t all Gordon’s fault, as their was no help defense behind him, but he could have showed a little bit better effort there.  The second bad moment for Gordon was an offensive foul followed by a pass to Dirk Nowitzki in overtime.  Gordon had 5 turnovers in the game.

In the past 5 games, Gordon is averaging 22.6 PPG and is shooting 60% from three point land.  His winter shooting slump appears to be over.

Tyrus Thomas was phenomenal tonight, finishing with 23 points and 12 rebounds.  He is starting to become more of an offensive force.  He has learned how to finish when he drvies to the basket and he is great at drawing and hitting free throws.

It is phenomenal that Thomas is going so strong into the trade deadline.  His value has to be skyrocketing.  The Bulls front office has to avoid falling too much in love with Tyrus.  If Amare Stoudemire or Chris Bosh are available, you trade Thomas for them and don’t think twice about it.

Derrick Rose had a mediocre game, scoring 22 points and dishing for 9 assists.  On the surface, that looks like a good game, but Rose shot the ball an inefficient 11 for 25 and played poor defense.  Rose was especially bad down the stretch, going 2 for 11 in his last 11 shots.

Jose Barea was great tonight, scoring 20 points and adding 6 assists to go along with that.  He especially gave Kirk Hinrich fits tonight in the second half.  Late in the third, Barea burst down the court past Kirk Hinrich for an easy layup.  The next play down, Nowitzki set a screen for Barea.  Gray showed lightly on Barea while Hinrich went under the screen.  Hinrich never got up to pressure Barea and Barea just pulled up for the long three.  Then Barea made a layup with 1:22 left in the game with Hinrich guarding him.

Joakim Noah was solid tonight with 8 points and 10 rebounds, although he seemed to get winded tonight.

Kirk Hinrich was terrible tonight scoring 10 points and committing 5 turnovers.  Andres Nocioni added in 13 points and 6 rebounds.

Luol Deng also had a really bad game.  Deng had just 10 points on 3-15 shooting.

Josh Howard added in 13 points for the Mavericks.

Jason Terry left the game at the half and did not return.  He broke his left ring finger in a play late in the second quarter.

With the loss, the Bulls fall to 22-29 on the season and are now sitting 2 full games behind New Jersey for the 8th seed in the Eastern Conference.

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Tags: Amare Stoudemire, Andres Nocioni, Ben Gordon, Chicago Bulls, Dallas Mavericks, Derrick Rose, Dirk Nowitzki, Hason Terry, Joakim Noah, Jose Barea, Josh Howard, Kirk Hinrich, Luol Deng, overtime, Tyrus Thomas

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 7th, 2009 at 11:39 pm and is filed under Game Recap. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.