Bulls finding ways to win without Rose
During Derrick Rose's first three seasons, the Bulls went 1-5 when the homegrown star missed games because of injury.
This year the Bulls began to have more success with Rose out of the lineup, but the results were unconvincing.
They beat low-quality teams such as Washington, Cleveland, Sacramento and Charlotte (twice), while getting buried in Memphis, losing at Boston and falling behind 22-3 in an ugly home loss to New Jersey.
In the past week, though, the supporting cast has pulled together in an amazing way.
The Bulls have beaten three of the top four playoff seeds in the East — Miami, Philadelphia and Orlando — with Rose watching from the bench.
They mixed in a loss to Portland, but still, with a 10-4 record minus Rose this season, the unmentiona-Bulls have been better than every team in the NBA, except Miami and Oklahoma City.
Against Orlando on Monday, the Bulls even set a franchise record for fewest points allowed in a regular-season game (59) and sent Tom Thibodeau into the history books for reaching 100 wins faster than any other NBA coach.
“It's one game at the end of the day,” Joakim Noah told reporters after the game. “But we felt like it was probably one of our best defensive efforts of the year.
“We've just got to keep it up, keep learning from what we're doing well, what we can do better, stay humble, stay driven and hopefully get the good thing at the end.”
When trying to figure out what has gone well with Rose nursing a groin injury, a couple of items stand out: an adaptable offense and accurate 3-point shooting.
The second category is easy to explain. In the 10 wins without Rose, the Bulls have shot 42.7 percent from behind the 3-point line. In the 4 losses, it has been 28.6 percent.
The Bulls were dialed in from long distance in the win over Miami, hitting 10 of 19 attempts.
Then guard John Lucas III came off the bench to knock down 4 of 7 shots from 3-point range against Orlando, including 3 in a span of 45 seconds late in the first quarter.
“I just felt like it opened up for me,” Lucas said after the game. “The first 3 felt good. Then, the fastbreak pull-up 3, I was like, ‘It's one of those nights.'
“Coach Thibs says to always stay ready. Because I'm playing doesn't mean we're going to lose. It shows the organization picked out the right players and the coaching staff did research on everybody.”
The point-guard tandem of Lucas and C.J. Watson has filled in well for Rose. During the games Rose has missed, Watson is averaging 12.9 points, while Lucas is at 10.2, which in itself helps replace Rose's production of 22.8 points per game.
Neither is as good defensively as Rose, but Thibodeau's team defense is able to hide plenty of individual deficiencies.
Watson and Lucas usually do an adequate job of picking each other up. Watson, for example, went 0-for-8 from the field for 1 point at Orlando. But Lucas made up for it by posting 20 points and outscoring every Magic player.
In the loss to Portland, the leading indicators didn't prevail. The Bulls' 3-point shooters went 8-for-27 (30 percent), and neither Lucas nor Watson could get his shot going.
Otherwise, there isn't a magic formula to winning without Rose.
Carlos Boozer stepped up by producing 24 points and 13 rebounds against Orlando. In the win over Miami, though, he finished with 2 points.
The Bulls have gotten some high-assist games from Watson and Lucas, but in each of the last three games, Noah has led the team in assists.
Finally, Monday's game was a performance to make Thibodeau proud. The Bulls were clearly locked in on the defensive game plan from the arrival of the team bus and were able to play from the lead for the final three quarters. The wins over Miami and Philadelphia were similar, but with slower starts.
“It just shows how good our defense can be,” Luol Deng said. “We've been up and down this year — not a lot of practices, a lot of guys hurt.
“But coach always says, ‘Even if guys aren't shooting the ball well, if you play defense, you're going to stay out there,' and we all know that.”
mmcgraw@dailyherald.com