Bulls prevail thanks to Deng’s last-second tip-in
By Mike McGraw
This night should have been all about ex-Bulls forward James Johnson, who has been toiling in Toronto since a trade midway through last season.
The guy who was required to carry around a “Dora and Boots” backpack as a rookie; the champion kickboxer from Cheyenne, Wyo., scored 20 points, hit a go-ahead free throw with 15 seconds left in overtime and played perfect defense on the game’s final two possessions.
Sometimes, though, the NBA will deliver a kick to the chin of a deserving underdog. Johnson smothered a C.J. Watson shot attempt in the waning seconds, but the deflected ball fluttered to Luol Deng, who tipped it in at the buzzer to give the Bulls a heart-stopping 102-101 victory in overtime Saturday at the United Center.
Replays showed the ball was an inch or so out of Deng’s hands when the red lights went on. That meant the shot counted and the Bulls improved their league’s best record to 40-10 with a very narrow escape.
“We were lucky to get that game. They outplayed us from the start,” Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau said. “They dominated us. They outrebounded us by 14. They played hard. We didn’t play well.”
The Bulls played without Derrick Rose for the sixth straight game, then lost center Joakim Noah, who was ejected for arguing a foul, then throwing the ball in the direction of the referee who made the call. The two technicals sent Noah to the locker room with 1:28 left in the second quarter.
“We are short-handed already,” Thibodeau said. “We can’t have that.”
The Bulls received quite a bit of good fortune, though. Toronto’s leading scorer, Andrea Bargnani, missed a couple of open looks at the end of regulation.
In the first overtime period for the Bulls this season, Johnson hit 1 of 2 free throws to put Toronto ahead with 15.2 seconds left, then blocked Deng’s layup attempt with authority.
The Bulls fouled Gary Forbes, who missed both free throws to give the home team another chance with 6.0 seconds on the clock.
Watson took a handoff and the Raptors switched defensively, but he couldn’t shake Johnson. Watson had to use a drastic fadeaway to even get a shot off. It had no chance of going in, but Johnson got a piece of it and Deng was in the right place at exactly the right time.
“That’s what happens sometimes,” Johnson said. “No one on the floor had any idea I was going to block the shot, so they were in box-out mode. It happened to fall short and Luol Deng made a great play. We deserved to win tonight, but they made the game-winning plays down the stretch.”
Johnson didn’t make a big deal about missing a chance to stick it to the team that traded him away.
“I forgot about that a long time ago,” Johnson said. “Gar Forman and John Paxson, I have a lot of respect for those guys. They let me go because they realized I had talent and they wanted to see me playing. To get back here and play against these guys is just fun, it’s always fun.”
mmcgraw@dailyherald.com