McDermott's effort goes to waste in Bulls loss
The Bulls watched an unlikely hero, guard E'Twaun Moore, step forward in Thursday's comeback victory over Oklahoma City.
They had to play the second leg of a back-to-back on Friday at Indiana. This time, rookie Doug McDermott stepped up as an unlikely contributor, but he didn't get much help.
The Bulls were tied heading into the fourth quarter, but faded down the stretch and lost to the Pacers 98-84 at Bankers Life Fieldhouse.
"I don't know if we ran out of gas, but we just didn't finish our defense as well as we could have," coach Tom Thibodeau told reporters after the game.
The Bulls weren't quite ready at the start, either, but recovered from an early 18-6 deficit, thanks to McDermott's second-quarter surge. The rookie from Creighton finished with a career-high 16 points on Friday.
McDermott had essentially been a forgotten man since undergoing arthroscopic knee surgery on Dec. 15. He'd played only in a few blowouts since returning from the injury, then returned to the rotation on Tuesday after Jimmy Butler was lost to an elbow injury.
McDermott played a total of 23 minutes against Washington and Oklahoma City and did not score. Against the Pacers, he resembled the confident, versatile scorer the Bulls traded up in the draft to select. He hit 8 of 17 shots and scored as much on the drive as with jump shots. McDermott was 0-for-1 from 3-point range.
"It was good to see the ball go in for him," Thibodeau said. "Hopefully, he can build from that. That's what we want him to do. I thought he moved well without the ball, we searched him out once he got going. He made the simple. It was good."
This was the sort of performance the Bulls felt they could get from McDermott this season. He looked good in summer league and scored 12 points in two of the first four games this season. But since then, he's been largely forgotten and hadn't been a major piece of the rotation since November.
"I think I was pressing," McDermott said in the locker room, according to espn.com. "I was out a long time and then not really playing a whole lot. I kind of got thrown in the mix there the last couple games, I wasn't quite comfortable. Today, I took a deep breath and just went out there and played basketball.
"Any scorer, once they see one go in, it just kind of opens everything else up. I still missed a lot of shots that I normally make which is frustrating and could have helped us win but it just felt good to kind of get my feet wet and play more minutes than I'm used to."
The Bulls (39-24) could have used a few more players like McDermott in this game. Pau Gasol led the Bulls with 18 points and Mike Dunleavy added 14.
Nikola Mirotic's run of three straight 20-point games came to an end. He finished with 10 points, hitting 3 of 13 shots from the field. Moore scored 5 points off the bench.
As a team, the Bulls hit just 5 of 23 shots from 3-point range. They needed a few long-range shots to go down in the fourth quarter, but couldn't get one to fall.
Forward Solomon Hill led six Pacers in double figures with 16 points. Indiana has won 12 of its last 15 games.
The Bulls move on to the second half of a tough four games in five nights. They play at San Antonio on Sunday afternoon, then host Memphis on Monday.
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