Rush-hour snow storm leaves Clippers running late
The visiting Los Angeles Clippers had a close call with the bad weather Friday night.
About half of their players arrived to the United Center early. But a second and third bus from the team's downtown hotel got hung up in the rush hour snowstorm. The second bus arrived at around 6:15 and the third bus at 6:30 for a scheduled 7:10 p.m. tip.
A couple of regulars, thought to be Avery Bradley and Lou Williams, were on the third bus. So was Clippers head coach Doc Rivers, which meant assistant Rex Kalamian had to fill in for the pregame coach's availability.
"There was an hour and 45-minute bus ride," Kalamian said. "But you know what? We're the type of team, we adjust well to adversity and things that are thrown at us. That bus ride was no different than landing in Miami two nights ago at 4 a.m. and no shootaround, just coming out and playing. That's what we'll do here.
"We're the type of group, we're ballers. We like to go out and play, under any circumstances. Hopefully it won't effect us at all."
Kalamian recalled a preseason bus ride that took nearly four hours to get from Santa Monica to Ontario, Calif. on a weekday afternoon.
"If you've been in the NBA long enough, you've encountered as lot of different things and this is no different," he said. "A little snow, little traffic - it won't effect us."
Deadline days:
Less than two weeks away from the Feb. 7 NBA trade deadline, Bulls coach Jim Boylen said he is not keeping tabs on whether anything's happening.
"I'm sure they're fielding calls," Boylen said. "When something's appropriate, I think they'll call me on it. I don't go upstairs and ask, 'What's going on? Are we doing this, are we doing that?' I wait for them to phone me when they need me. If they want to ask me something, great. I'm focused on practice and coaching the team and improving."
Zach LaVine was asked a similar question after Thursday's practice.
"That is not my field of work. I don't know," LaVine said. "Hopefully something happens good for the team. If it is being quiet and then us saying they have faith in us or something happens and we make a change and we improve. But I really don't know. I haven't been with the Bulls organization long enough to figure out what they want to do at the trade deadline."
Portis starts at center:
Jim Boylen shifted the starting lineup Friday, using Bobby Portis at center while Robin Lopez came off the bench. The Clippers started essentially a three-guard lineup, with Tobias Harris at power forward and a true center in Marcin Gortat.
"I just think that this is a good situation for him (Portis) to start," Boylen said. "I think RoLo matches up better with (backup Montrezl) Harrell in that second group."
The Bulls got off to a slow start in Friday's game, trailing 27-20 after one. Portis hit just 1 of 6 shots, but did grab 7 rebounds in the opening quarter.