The Tale of Two Halfs

For the first half of Thursdays playoff game between the Chicago Bulls and the Detroit Pistons, the Chicago Bulls looked like the best team in the NBA. The hard playing, defensive team showed itself for the first time in the playoffs as the Bulls raced to a 44-28 first half lead over the Detroit Pistons. The Bulls held the Pistons to just 10 points in the second quarter and only 33% shooting along with 8 turnovers as it looked like the Bulls were well on their way to winning game 3 of the best of 7 playoff series. Detroit was 0-8 in three point attempt. The Bulls were out rebounding them. Chicago was not fouling as well because Detroit had just 2 free throw attempts the entire first half.

The defense that I saw Chicago play was some of the best defense I have seen a Bulls team play in a long time. Then came the second half.

Lead by Billups and Prince and a zone defense, the Pistons outscored the Bulls 32-17 in the 3rd quarter. Detroit took advantage of the small guards that the Bulls have and posted them up time and time again. The Bulls didnt have the same defensive entencity they had in the first half. They even started making silly mistakes that cost them shot attempts.

Quarter 4 was more of the same. Detroit held Chicago to 13 points, 30 for the entire half as they went on to win game 3 81-74 setting up a possible sweep of the series in Chicago on Sunday.

As I watched the game it looked to me like the Bulls ran out of gas in the 4th quarter. Why would they do that if they were used to playing hard all year? Aren't they conditioned? Yes they are, but for some reason Skiles didn't do his normal substitution pattern and went with the top 6 or 7 players for most of the second half. Because of that, the Bulls were clanking shots and missing free throws when they counted. The defense was not there as well! The Bulls ended the game shooting yet another 34%!

They out rebounded Detroit by 17 yet that resulted in just 2 more shot attempts than Detroit had.

Another reason for the loss was the fact that once again the Bulls cannot hit their 3's. They were 2-13 for 16%.

Leading scorer was Prince with 21. He was followed by Billups and Deng with 21. Hamilton, Sheed' and Gordon had 16 each.