Bulls fall short against Thunder

This short-handed stuff is getting old for the Bulls.

For the second straight game, they got blasted on the boards, still put themselves in position to win, but ultimately fell short. Trailing by 1 as late as the 1:40 mark, the Bulls faded down the stretch in a 109-100 loss Sunday at Oklahoma City.

The Bulls were outrebounded 52-33 by the Thunder. On Friday in a loss at Charlotte, they were beaten on the boards 55-36. Those are the two worst rebound deficits of the season for the Bulls.

Once again, the Bulls played without Jimmy Butler (elbow), Taj Gibson (ankle) and Derrick Rose (knee). There's no doubt the Bulls lack some toughness without Gibson or Butler, who rank third and fourth on the team in rebounds.

Pau Gasol led the Bulls on Sunday with 8 rebounds, to go with 20 points. Nikola Mirotic was the top scorer with 27 points.

After the game, coach Tom Thibodeau talked about the pros and cons of using Mirotic at power forward.

"He spread the floor," Thibodeau said. "Again, when you're playing a stretch-four like that, you're going to give up some rebounding, and that's what we did. So it was good at times offensively but defensively it was problematic."

That theory isn't foolproof. Mirotic led the Bulls with 9 rebounds at Charlotte. He grabbed 4 boards Sunday, 1 more than Joakim Noah had in a similar number of minutes.

Thibodeau revealed after the game Noah was on a minutes limit, which is why he didn't play down the stretch in the fourth quarter. Despite the lack of rebounds, Noah led the Bulls with 7 assists and scored 15 points, his highest total since Feb. 8.

"I ran out of minutes with him," Thibodeau said. "But I thought Jo played a very good game for us. He didn't rebound particularly well, but I thought offensively he was very good. I thought his passing and his finishing - he rolled hard on the pick-and-roll and I thought was very effective for him."

Noah had arthroscopic surgery on his left knee last May and the recovery has been a struggle. His minutes increased after the all-star break, when he put together a string of nine straight double-digit rebounding games.

But Noah sat out Wednesday's game in Philadelphia to rest a sore knee, so the need for a minutes limit appears to have returned.

Oklahoma City (37-29) played without Kevin Durant (foot) and Serge Ibaka (knee), so the short-handed scenario was mutual. Russell Westbrook missed a triple-double but turned in his usual huge game with 36 points, 11 rebounds and 6 assists.

The Thunder's replacement big men cleaned the glass nicely. Enes Kanter, who was quiet when these teams met in Chicago on March 5, piled up 18 points and 18 rebounds Sunday. Steven Adams had 14 points and 11 boards.

Despite the obstacles, the Bulls took an 80-78 lead with 9:26 left on Noah's driving lay-in. The game stayed close through most of the fourth quarter, at least until a Mirotic lay-in made it 96-95 with 1:40 remaining.

Westbrook hit a free throw, then stole a pass and took it all the way for a lay-in. After E'Twaun Moore lost the ball out of bounds, Westbrook hit Anthony Morrow for a 3-pointer that put the game on ice with 40 seconds left.

The Bulls (40-28) have 14 games left - seven at home and seven away. The playoff seed isn't nearly as important as getting everyone healthy. With two days off before hosting Indiana, the Bulls are hoping Gibson or Butler will reappear this week.

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