Subscribe
Follow Us
The Chicago Bulls' season is over as they lost in the NBA play-in tournament against the Miami Heat on Wednesday night. The Bulls came into the game as the favorite, but this one was never close as the Heat cruised to an easy 109-90 win. This is now the third year in a row that Miami has ended the Bulls' season in the play-in tournament.
Chicago can't find a way to get past Miami in the postseason. The two teams played last week in Chicago and the Bulls picked up a relatively stress-free win, but when it turned into the postseason, it looked like two different teams out on the court. The Bulls had no answer.
“They punched us first, and we didn't respond the way we had to,” Josh Giddey said after the game, according to an article from ESPN. “Credit to Miami. They're well-coached; they're a good team. They've been in this position before, as same of our guys here. We obviously knew what was at stake tonight. We just didn't come out with the right mentality, the right mindset. And it's what happens — you lose, your season's over just like that.”
The Heat came out of the gates hot as they took a double-digit lead in the first quarter, and by the time halftime rolled around, it had swelled to 24.
Chicago played well in the third quarter to make things closer, but they were never able to get the deficit below 13. It looked like they might be able to make things interesting down the stretch, but the Heat tightend things up in the fourth quarter and easily picked up the win.
Bulls head coach Billy Donovan shares ‘disappointed' take after loss
The Bulls have been in this same position before as they have been in the NBA play-in tournament three years in a row now. This year felt different, however. Chicago turned things around after the All-Star break as they were 17-10 since February 20th. They were playing their best basketball at the right time, but they didn't have it on Wednesday.
“The disappointment part for me is you know when you get to this point in the season games are going to be grind out games — I mentioned these are experiences these guys are going to have to go through, quite honesty — and the disappointing part was we didn’t play to our (fast paced offensive) identity,” Billy Donovan said after the game, according to an article from NBA.com. “I’m hopeful for some of our guys this can be a real good growth opportunity. It’s unfortunate because I thought with all the uncertainty and getting the group together, they did a good job since the trade deadline. I appreciated the way these guys tried to come together and the way they worked all year long. I just wish it would have been a better game for us the way we play. But also give Miami credit, they did the things they had to do in the game.”
A lot of things went wrong for the Bulls in the play-in tournament against the Heat, but Billy Donovan pointed to one specific problem after the game.
“I thought our issue was whether it was (Davion) Mitchell, Herro, (Andrew) Wiggins, we could not control the ball at all,” he added. “I don’t think it necessarily was Coby or Josh; it was everybody. We had a really hard time maintaining the ball in the coverage and in pick and rolls. Our inability to control the basketball at the point of the screen and the fact that there were a couple of opportunities for us to go vertical at the rim and we jumped to the side and tried to block shots and gave them angles coupled with the fact we turned the ball over, and it was a struggle offensively, not making shots. It was everybody. We were unable to contain the basketball. They came out and executed way better than we did; they deserved the game the way they played all the way around. I think we kind of got out of character of how we have played for a pretty long stretch.”
Now, the season is over for the Bulls. Another disappointing year in in the books for the team, and it's back to the drawing board.
