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Friends, I ain't got much for you after that. Stunned is a good word. Cattle-prod stunned is better. The Heat's 18-3 game-ending, series-ending, season-ending run went very much like this, if you didn't see it:
One of the things you're taught when gambling in Vegas is to never, ever say "It can't get worse." Because it will, every single time. After Game 4's OT heartbreaker, I thought it couldn't get worse. Most teams never come back from a 3-1 deficit, so I decided to just enjoy Game 5 and root for my Bulls. And then the Miami Drive-by happened.
Up 12 with three minutes left and the game almost certainly in hand, the Bulls took their foot off the gas against one of, if not the most dangerous offensive team in the NBA. What happened next will haunt the Bulls every single day until they beat the Heat in the playoffs or win the championship outright. LeBron James and Dwyane Wade took Miami on an 18-3 run in two minutes and change, and faster than you can say Kurt Thomas, the lights at the United Center went out, never to come on again this season.
No consolation prizes tonight, friends, and no sugar-coating either. Chicago did everything it had to do to win again, and still blew it's fourth straight game in the fourth quarter. And like some kind of sick movie, each fourth quarter meltdown was worse than the one that preceded it, finishing tonight with an all-time stomach punch. I can barely feel my legs right now.
Derrick Rose went from Mariano Rivera to Mitch Williams in this series, wilting in the game's, and the season's, final possession. No sense of control, no sense of purpose, a whole lot of panic. As he handed off to Kyle Korver (which doesn't get him open, by the way) Rose herked and jerked his way back to the ball before getting his desperation heave blocked at the buzzer. He looked like a shell of the MVP we've seen all season as he walked off the floor. Let me paint it two different ways: Rose finished with 25 points, eight assists and five rebounds. On the other hand he went 9-29 from the floor with four turnovers. Credit the Miami Heat defense for making Rose more uncomfortable than a million dental appointments. The league's MVP was, I hate to say it, solved to a certain extent by Erik Spoelstra's schemes and the Heat's talent.
I feel bad for a lot of people, but Luol Deng probably most of all. Deng filled his averages again with 18/7/4 and ignited the crowd early with a brilliant breakaway dunk on LeBron. Deng had no intention of going fishing after today's game, and whether it's a testament to him or a condemnation of Rose (in this game, I still love the kid), I found myself wishing Deng would get the ball on the final possession.
It was going so well for Chicago, with Kurt Thomas coming in and making a huge impact for the Bulls, both on the floor and with the energy he brought to the arena. His four points and eight rebounds in 18 minutes and Ronnie Brewer's 10 points -- including what seemed like a dagger 3 late in the fourth quarter (off a Thomas offensive board) -- should have been more than enough for the Bulls to get back to Miami for Game 6.
Then LeBron and Wade went on a 10 point run in about a minute, with two 3's from James (both undefended) and a 4-point play from Wade when Rose fouled him on a three from the angle. You just kept waiting for the Bulls to get it together, to get that one last stop and a hoop on the other end to put an end to the madness. And it just never came. James' shots fell without touching the net, and the Bulls offense was a clogged toilet for the last 5 minutes of regulation.
And so, after allowing us all to dream of Game 6 and what could have been, the season is over in gunshot-quick fashion and we're left crying over the body. Next year the Bulls will have almost 30 million dollars invested in their starting frontcourt. Joakim Noah and Carlos Boozer were flat-out awful in this game, both finishing the game with five points, and eight and six rebounds respectively. Thomas and Taj Gibson were on the floor in the game's final minutes as Thibs went with what was working, because the Bulls' starting frontcourt simply was not. I want to strap Boozer to a chair, tape his eyelids open and make him watch every failed defensive rotation he made this year. He might be done by the time training camp rolls around. Noah on the other hand regressed mightily in this series, especially on the offensive end. After really coming out strong against the Pacers and Hawks in this postseason, he looked like his 2007 rookie self against the Heat. Noah desperately needs to find his own offense during the offseason so he can become the complete player the Bulls need down low. Were I him I'd start with that lefty hook that actually show some promise and develop two counter-moves. There's your summer, Jo.
In the days ahead perhaps this won't feel as bad. The Bulls are young, growing as a team, with a solid core and the arrow pointing up. From the top of the organization to the bottom there is a lot to smile about, but right now I can't think about any of those things. Because of all the teams in all the places in all the situations, the Miami Heat pulled the drive-by that will live in infamy and shot this brilliant season dead.
Enjoy your adult beverages, ladies and gents. And don't forget to pour some out for the Bulls.
Having lost three straight games for the first time all season, the Chicago Bulls are in unfamiliar, and treacherous, territory. Unless they win three straight games against the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference Finals, which continue Thursday night, their season will end prematurely.
But the Bulls have been competitive in these games, even the losses. Their inexperience, and dearth of talent compared to Miami, has cost them dearly, which one observes most clearly in the struggles of league MVP Derrick Rose in the fourth of games in this series. As Sun-Times writer Herb Gould notes, the Bulls point guard "has gone 2-for-14 in the fourth quarter and overtime" during the last three games, with the Heat switching All-NBA defender LeBron James onto him and sending extra defenders if needed. Without a reliable second option--not even top-dollar free-agent addition Carlos Boozer--the Bulls have faltered with Rose simply trying to do too much.
The last 24 hours haven't made the Bulls' Game 4 loss any easier to swallow. As with all the great stomach-punch games, the bad vibes from this one got worse before they got better. Better being a relative term.
It hasn't felt like a wake, the way the Bears NFC championship loss to the Packers did, but it's pretty close. The Bulls, after cruising so far and so fast this season, jerked the wheel into a bridge abutment in Miami and are in are now in intensive care. The season is touch-and-go. Critical condition seems as appropriate a phrase as any. When the Bulls tip off Game 5 at 7:30 Thursday night at the United Center, they will be playing for their lives.
I could dive into how much Game 4 sucked, but I won't. Rather, I'm finding it amazing to think that this incredible run could come to such an abrupt end. I think it's fair to say that this year has exceeded expectations, but somewhere during the second half of the season when the kool-aid got passed out, I enjoyed a nice tall glass. Now this just hurts, as the idea of the league's winningest team, one with an MVP, a Coach of The Year, an Executive Of The Year, hell, even a 12th Man Of The Year award could be over as of tomorrow night is frankly pretty shocking. How did things go so badly so quickly?
Statistics say that 96% of the NBA teams to trail 3-1 in a series end up losing. And that's before factoring in the Thunder's series-ending loss to the Mavericks on Wednesday night. I could burn a couple thousand words on what's gone wrong and what it all means. But that is a post for another day... and hopefully never.
Crazier things have happened. That's all I'm going to say. Crazier things. Have. Happened. As Derrick Rose might say, why not three straight?
With no hyperbole (finally!), I can say that this is a must-win game for the Bulls. So before we go through the minutia of what it will take to win, it's time to pull out all the stops.
It's rather freeing to have every cliché at one's fingertips, if only for a single column.
The goal is not to think about the series but to think about Game 5, a task made more difficult by the fact that the Bulls are human. Yes, even Omer Asik, who despite being the recipient of my favorite personal nickname (The Turkish Plow), suffered a broken leg in Game 3 and then, incredibly, was allowed to play on it for Game 4. Not surprisingly, he couldn't play through, again, A BROKEN LEG and has since been declared done for the series. After going so far as to confront then-coach Vinnie Del Negro -- reportedly jabbing him in the chest for playing Joakim Noah extra minutes while he was recovering from plantar fascitis -- it's hard to believe that John Paxson or any other member of the front office would allow a rookie seven-footer with gigantic promise to risk further damage to a big-time injury. Boy it's a good thing there's not a long history of big men healing poorly from leg injuries (COUGH Yao Ming Greg Oden Sam Bowie Andrew Bynum et al COUGH).
But as we look for the positives heading into a do-or-die (cliché!) game, it's best to begin at the United Center. In case you'd forgotten, the Bulls went 36-5 at home during the regular season. They have followed that up with a 6-2 playoff record, the two losses occurring in Game 1 of the semis versus the Hawks and Game 2 against the Heat. The two playoff losses were horrible to watch, as Chicago couldn't throw it into the ocean in either game and although they had a chance late, couldn't overcome it on those nights. That said, I look at the way both home games of this series went and the Bulls felt like the better team in both games. At the very least there was no semblance of the superiority Miami has displayed in South Beach, where apparently all of their talents lie. As much as the last three games have done to vaporize good feelings from this season, let's not forget how unbelievably hard it is for an opposing team to win in the UC.
Rose is a player that, up until Game 4, has always answered the call in big games. And while the expectations for the 22 year-old are through the roof, anyone who watches basketball knows how transcendent LeBron James can be. Call me crazy, but I never thought Rose was better than LBJ. I just liked him more. So it comes with a heavy heart but not a lot of surprise that LeBron won the matchup between the two superstars. LeBron's been there and taken his licks before. Rose, up to this point, hasn't. Game 4 was his first taste of being on the receiving end of a classic playoff performance. The idea of Derrick Rose coming back from an off-night (he almost always bounces back), in the biggest game of his life (bright lights make him shine), and a chance for redemption (takes any perceived slight personally) has me thinking good thoughts. Now is not the time to doubt Rose, Chicago. He will answer the call.
The rest of the Bulls' core continues to play well, although Noah has been a walking facepalm when looking for his own shot on offense, and Carlos Boozer has been such a defensive trainwreck that I have started drinking shots every time he rotates properly. I had two on Tuesday. Luol Deng is just a rock though, giving the Bulls everything he's had for 82 games and 15 grueling postseason tilts. No matter how this final battle shakes out, I think we can all agree that Deng has reached full-fledged Beloved status in the Windy City. The Bulls will need big games from three of their top four players to win Game 5. You can pretty much pencil it in for Lu.
Can the Bulls win three in a row? Right now, who cares? This is about winning Game 5 and figuring out the rest later. The hope is that Thibodeau's everything-exactly-the-same-always routine helps his team focus in. That Rose finds the daylight he needs and we get to hear one more UC pop from a D-Rose dunk. That three pointers actually go in at a respectable rate. That Kyle Korver gets to have at least one effective stint in this series. That Noah claps good and loud in between a bunch offensive boards and a few of those lefty hooks. That the Bench gets to mob one more time (this one's for Omer!). That Boozer screams And-1 and is actually right about it for once. That the Bulls remind us all what we fell in love with for 97 games and counting.
It's been too good of a trip to end this quickly, Heat be damned. But no matter what happens in Game 5, I will be there soaking up every second of it, clapping and facepalming and wooing all the way, for no other reason than one of the most enjoyable Bulls' teams of my life deserves it.
With LeBron James Defending, Derrick Rose Shoots 6.3 Percent In Eastern Conference Finals
by Evan Dunlap
Overall, Bulls point guard Derrick Rose had a shaky Eastern Conference Finals. Yes, he averaged 23.4 points per game... but he also needed 24 shots, on average, to get there. His final percentages from the field tell the tale: 35 percent overall, and 23.3 percent on six three-point attempts per game.
But it gets worse. Per ESPN Stats & Information, when LeBron James defended Rose over the last two games of the series, Rose shot 6.3 percent (1-of-15) and committed three turnovers. James, despite standing taller and weighing more than Rose, nonetheless managed to hound him into some truly awful play.
These numbers further add to LeBron's greatness, but they don't undermine the fine season Rose had; he did not win MVP on accident. If there's anything good to take away from this, from Chicago's perspective, is that this epic flame-out might drive Rose to improve even more in the offseason.
This series won't be the last time the Bulls and Heat face each other in the postseason. Maybe Rose will be better prepared next time.
May 27 11:38a