Rose soars as Bulls stop NBA’s top team
If this was college football, they might call Derrick Rose’s performance a “Heisman moment.”
The league’s best team was in the house for a nationally televised contest leading into the all-star break. All but four NBA teams had the night off.
That means plenty of influential people watched Rose drop a career-high 42 points and 8 assists Thursday as the Bulls knocked off the league-leading San Antonio Spurs 109-99 at the United Center.
This wasn’t Auburn vs. Alabama, though, so call this an MVP moment. If the vote were taken tomorrow, it would be tough to make a coherent argument otherwise.
Coach Tom Thibodeau’s first words at his news conference were, “He’s something, huh?”
Not surprisingly, Spurs coach Gregg Popovich offered plenty of praise.
“He has taken a monster leap this year,” Popovich said of Rose. “What’s really great about him is he seems to love the pressure of putting his team on his back. He has the character and the demeanor to do that.”
This weekend Boston will bring four players to the all-star game and Miami has three. Rose isn’t exactly flying solo, but center Joakim Noah did miss his 30th game of the season Thursday. The Bulls will head into the break with an impressive 38-16 record, despite the injury issues.
Rose hit 18 of 28 shots from the field and all 6 of his free throws. When the Bulls lost at San Antonio on Nov. 17, Rose scored 33 points but attempted just a single free throw.
The hometown hero just gets better and better. Spurs forward Tim Duncan was once the NBA’s top defender, but he may have suffered mild wind burn from Rose rushing by him so quickly.
Rose talked about being MVP on the eve of training camp. But now that it actually is happening, he’s staying low-key. He barely even smiled when he met reporters in the locker room.
“I was trying to win. That’s the biggest thing,” he said. “That led me to shoot the ball more. Tonight, the shots were falling.”
Asked jokingly if he’s ready to lobby MVP voters on Rose’s behalf, Thibodeau’s answer was he doesn’t need to.
“I think the writers vote on that, right? I don’t even know who votes for it,” Thibodeau said. “Derrick’s done a good enough job by his play. I think anyone who’s watched and you see the things he’s done from the start of the season until now, I can’t imagine anyone doing more.”
The only flaw in Rose’s game was he allowed San Antonio point guard Tony Parker to score 26 points. But part of the Spurs’ game plan was to make Rose work on defense and fight through endless screens. Didn’t work.
Luol Deng added 19 points and Carlos Boozer scored 15. The Bulls actually got a decent effort from the bench, led by Ronnie Brewer with 9 points.
Rose left little doubt he was locked in from the time he walked into the arena. He scored 11 points in the first quarter by draining his rapidly spinning jumpers, driving past the Spurs’ older big men with ease and even scoring off an offensive rebound.
The Bulls were in control from the beginning. But every time they’d open a decent lead, San Antonio knocked down a couple of 3-pointers to close the gap.
The Spurs (46-10) pulled within 79-75 with two minutes left in the third quarter. On the Bulls’ next trip, Ronnie Brewer missed a shot and Rose was knocked to the floor near the basket. He got up, grabbed the rebound and followed it in.
Rose added another basket to make it 83-75 after three quarters. San Antonio rookie Gary Neal opened the fourth by nailing a 3-pointer to make it a 5-point game.
Now with Rose getting a rest, the Bulls pulled away with a 9-0 run. C.J. Watson found Brewer for a dunk, Taj Gibson slammed in an Omer Asik miss, and Deng drained a 3-pointer before Gibson’s bank made it 92-78 with nine minutes left.
The Spurs figured to be feeling the grind of travel. This was the ninth stop on their annual rodeo road trip, although they hadn’t played since Monday.