The Chicago Bulls fell to the Portland Trail Blazers 109 to 95 for their second loss to the Blazers this season.
The Bulls problems were clear tonight, three of their perimeter players did not play appropriate defense. Derrick Rose lethargically chased Steve Blake around, leaving him open for threes. Luol Deng, like Rose, lethargically chased around Travis Outlaw, leaving him open for threes. And Andres Nocioni, while energetic on defense, ignores his defensive assignment, and goes and doubles someone elses man.
Steve Blake hit four threes in the game, and finished with 16 points and 10 assists. But Travis Outlaw was the real killer, coming off the bench for 33 points, making four three pointers.
Drew Gooden led the Bulls in scoring, putting in 22 points and grabbing 9 rebounds. Gooden was completely overmatched by Greg Oden, who he was assigned to guard. Greg Oden burned the Bulls for the second time this season, finishing with 17 points and 13 rebounds. Too bad for Oden that he can’t play the league’s worst front court every game.
Derrick Rose had a good passing night, and that’s about it. Rose finished the game with 10 assists. Defensively, Rose was lazy, leaving Blake wide open for three many times throughout the game. Offensively, Rose finished with 13 points on 5-14 shooting. Rose had some nice drives to the basket, but he really struggled with his shooting.
One thing Rose is going to learn is that he has to practice hard to become the best. For almost the entirety of the pre-game shoot around, Rose was engaged in a lackadaisical one on one game with Drwe Gooden, in which Rose bricked almost all of his shots. Rose should take a hint from Gordon, and perform a serious pre-game shooting routine.
Ben Gordon had an alright game, finishing with 17 points and 3 assists. Gordon drove to the basket pretty well. Shooting wise, Gordon had a tough night, missing most of his shots in the fourth. Shooters have off nights, and this was an off night for Gordon. While Gordon had 4 turnovers, none of them were from mental lapses. One was from an offensive foul, one was a pass that bounced off Noah’s stone hands, one was a pass that Luol Deng should have caught, but sailed out of bounds because of Luol’s 2 inch vertical on his jump, and the other was a pass that Gordon just mishandeled. Still, Gordon needs to cut down on the handling turnovers.
Defensively, Ben Gordon did a pretty good job on Brandon Roy, and brought a lot of energy tonight. The new found defensive energy might be in response to Kirk Hinrich’s return, who Gordon will have to fend off to keep his starting spot.
Kirk Hinrich looked really good on the defensive end of the ball. He was playing great positional defense with a lot of energy. Hinrich looks to have returned to his All Defensive Team level of defense. Hinrich finished with 4 points and 3 assists in his return.
Luol Deng looked bad overall tonight, looking lethargic on defense, and shooting the ball poorly. Deng needs to bring more energy in the future. Tonight’s level of effort from Deng is unacceptable.
Thabo Sefolosha, who got the start at small forward, finished with 8 points and 8 rebounds. He looked good in his limited minutes, making some nice cuts to the basket.
Tyrus Thomas had an alright game. He didn’t really contribute much according to the box score, but his defense was pretty good. He played within himself, and didn’t try to take over on offense.
LaMarcus Aldridge and Rudy Fernandez both had 8 points for the Blazers.
With the return of Kirk Hinrich and Luol Deng, Larry Hughes was ushered into a new bench role. Del Negro only allotted 7 minutes for Hughes tonight, and that number likely would have been less if Gordon didn’t get in early foul trouble.
Portland general manager, Kevin Pritchard, was in attendance tonight.
With the loss, the Bulls fall to 16-22 on the season.
