The Chicago Bulls defeated the Minnesota Timberwolves 110-96 at the United Center tonight, ending the Bulls three game losing streak.

The Bulls opened up a double digit lead on the Timberwolves in the third quarter, and coasted to an easy victory.

Joakim Noah led the Bulls, scoring 20 points and grabbing 9 rebounds. Kirk Hinrich also scored 20 points and dished 7 assists. The most encouraging thing about Hinrich’s performance tonight was that he went 4-9 from three point shooting. If guys like Hinrich and Salmons start hitting their three point shots again, the Bulls will find it much easier to win.

Taj Gibson also had a nice game, finishing with 13 points an 9 rebounds. Gibson started the struggling with his shot, but he found his stroke after having a shot bounce off the top of the backboard and into the basket. This game helps to further cement Gibson’s spot in the starting lineup with this performance, and Tyrus Thomas’ struggling performance. Thomas does a lot of positives on the court, finishing with 9 points, 5 rebounds, 3 blocks, and 2 steals, but he continuously screws himself out of a starting spot by mixing the good with a lot of bad, boneheaded plays, as evidenced by his 6 turnovers tonight.

The Bulls got good performances off the bench from Brad Miller and John Salmons. Brad Miller finished with 12 points and 5 rebounds. Miller has been having a lot of success with his slow motion drives the past few games. John Salmons had 14 points on 6-10 shooting.

James Johnson also had a pretty good game. Nothing eye popping, as he finished with 6 points on 2-2 shooting, 4 rebounds, and 3 assists, but it was still the best that he’s looked in a game this year in my opinion. He showed flashes of his talents in leading some Bulls’ fastbreaks.

Derrick Rose finished with 8 points and 7 assists, and Luol Deng also finished with 8 points.

For the Timberwolves, Johnny Flynn had 14 points and 8 assists, and Corey Brewer and Al Jefferson scored 12 points each. Kevin Love had 9 points and 10 rebounds.

Ryan Gomes led the Timberwolves in scoring with 15 points off the bench.

The Bulls did what they were supposed to do tonight in taking care of business against a terrible Minnesota Timberwolves teams. The only team worse than the Timberwolves are the Nets, so this is the type of game that is a must win, and the Bulls did that tonight.

With the win, the Bulls improve to 15-20 on the season.

The Chicago Bulls defeated the Minnesota Timberwolves 94 to 90 at the United Center last night.

Tyrus Thomas was huge in this game, finishing with 22 point, 13 rebounds, and 2 blocks. Tyrus did exactly what you want out of him last night. He was active on the boards, and he was aggressive attacking the basket. When Tyrus attacks like this on offense, he usually scores. Nice to see Tyrus Thomas go and put up a 22/13 game a day after saying he could average 20/10 for the season.

Taj Gibson scored 14 points and grabbed 6 rebounds. He continues to put up solid game after solid game.

James Johnson had a solid 10 points on 4-8 shooting. Joakim Noah added in 8 points and 5 rebounds.

Jannero Pargo had 13 points and 7 assists. He looked to pass more tonight than he had in previous games, and the results were good. It also helps to have another finisher out there in Tyrus Thomas.

Al Jefferson finished with 10 points and 16 rebounds for the Timberwolves. Corey Brewer had 20 points and Johnny Flynn had 10 points an 8 assists.

Kirk Hinrich finished with 12 points on 3-11 shooting and 5 assists. Not a great shooting game for Hinrich, but he helped to mitigate the bad shooting day by getting to the line five times, which is nice to see.

Luol Deng had another bad game, scoring 6 points on 2-7 shooting. This is a disturbing trend. Through six preseason games, he is shooting 50.2 TS%. If he continues to do that in the regular season, he needs to be benched in favor of James Johnson, and the Bulls should look to trade him for any expiring contract available. There is no guarantee that any team would offer an expiring contract for Deng. You can’t have players scoring this inefficiently in your starting lineup, or off your bench, if you want to be a great team.

With the win, the Bulls improved to 5-1 in preseason play.

Closing Comments

The Bulls have done nothing yet in the preseason to get you too excited for the regular season. All the teams that they have beaten in the preseason thus far have been mediocre to bad. However, there is reason to be excited because of the play of the Bulls’ front court. Joakim Noah, Tyrus Thomas, James Johnson, and Taj Gibson have all looked good. If they can continue the good production into the regular season, the Bulls should be able to make the playoffs, as they will get good perimeter play out of Kirk Hinrich, John Salmons, and Derrick Rose.

Hopefully the Bulls frontcourt continues to play this way into the regular season, because we will be good if that’s the case.

The Chicago Bulls defeated the Minnesota Timberwolves 93-85 to cap off a successful summer league.

James Johnson looked good once again. Johnson finished with 18 points, 7 rebounds, and 4 assists.

Johnson found most of his success scoring wise taking his man off the dribble, scoring with short shots, and also drawing fouls and hitting his free throws. His jumpshots were off once again.

His passing was crisp as well, often finding his teammates who were cutting to the basket, just at the right time.

Johnson had a great show of strength with 3:56 left in the second quarter. The Wolves had a 2 on 1 fastbreak, and Johnson was defending the break. Devin Green ended up being the guy getting to go for the layup, and Johnson went for the block, and he just knocked Green to the ground hard, even though he didn’t swing too hard into Green.

Demarcus Nelson looked good today as well, scoring 18 points on 7-10 shooting. He got a lot of points driving to the hoop, throwing in short runners and layups. I can’t see this translating into the regular season agains’t more legitimate shotblockers than what he is going up against in summer league.

Anthony Roberson had a solid game, scoring 15 points on 5-12 shooting.

Corey Brewer led the Timberwolves in scoring with 20 points.

Johnny Flynn came off the bench for the Timberwolves, and finished with 7 points, 7 assists, and 4 turnovers. Flynn’s athleticism is impressive, and the potential is definitely there for him to be a good point guard in the NBA. Flynn finished the game off with a windmill dunk that got the crowd excited. Flynn really struggled today, and Nelson’s strong defense was a big factor in this.

Taureen Green had 10 points an 8 assists off the bench for the Bulls, and Tyrell Biggs chipped in 12 points.

For the Timberwolves, Gary Siler finished with 12 points, and Wayne Ellington finished with 10 points.

With the win, the Bulls finish the 2009 Las Vegas Summer League with a 3-2 record.

The Chicago Bulls fell to the Minnesota Timberwolves 96-86 in preseason play. This is the Bulls third straight loss and they now are 0-3 in preseason play. Minnesota improved to 3-1 this preseason.

The Bulls jumped out to an early lead, finishing the first quarter with a 30-13 lead. The Timberwolves went on a 23-5 run at the end of the second quarter and ended the half with a 46-45 lead.

It was smooth sailing for Minnesota after that. The Bulls were able to bring the game within 2 late in the fourth, but Minnesota finished the game on a 10-3 run to beat the Bulls.

Derrick Rose, who came off the bench, was impressive, scoring 9 points and dishing 7 assists. Rose connected with Andres Nocioni multiple times for threes. Nocioni was able to make use of Rose’s great passing by just catching and shooting the ball, rather than taking a dribble before shooting, as Stacey King alluded to during the broadcast. Nocioni finished with 18 points.

Drew Gooden was also impressive, scoring 20 points and grabbing 8 rebounds.

Luol Deng came on strong to start the game, scoring 8 points in the first quarter. However, Deng fell apart as the game went on, and shot 5-14 overall in the game. Deng has yet to get anything going so far in this preseason. It is becoming clear that Deng isn’t cut out to be a first option in the NBA. Deng could easily find himself as the fourth option on offense, behind Derrick Rose, Ben Gordon, and Drew Gooden.

For the first time in preseason, Aaron Gray had a poor showing. He did set some nice screens for Rose in the second quarter, but didn’t do a lot of other positive things on the court. Gray finished with 0 points and 0 rebounds. Gray came into the game as the Bulls’ leading scorer and rebounder in preseason play.

For Minnesota, Corey Brewer had 15 points and 9 rebounds. Al Jefferson chipped in 13 points and 7 rebounds.

The Bulls next game is Friday against the Utah Jazz. The game will be on CSN-Chicago. The game will be played n Champaign, IL and will be Deron William’s homecoming to Assembly Hall.