Play-in tourney looms for Bulls without a quick turnaround
Even when the Bulls were battling for first place in the Eastern Conference, one look at the standings made it clear how they could easily slide to sixth place with a couple of bad weeks.
Well, it's actually been four bad weeks and now the Bulls are in danger of falling into the play-in tournament if they lose at Cleveland on Saturday.
A loss to the Cavaliers will likely create a three-way tie for fifth, sixth and seventh place in the East, since Toronto should beat Indiana at home Saturday. After their latest fourth-quarter collapse in New Orleans, the Bulls are 3-10 in their last 13 games and have dropped eight of the last nine on the road.
"Obviously, we're trying to figure out how to get back in a rhythm," Zach LaVine said after the Pelicans game. "We want to be going into the latter part of the season on a high note. We've got to figure it out."
Here's a quick refresher on how the play-in tournament works. The No. 7 and 8 seeds square off, as do 9 and 10. The winner of the 7-8 games gets the No. 7 playoff seed. The loser of the 7-8 game hosts the 9-10 winner with the No. 8 seed at stake.
At the moment, Brooklyn is sitting in eighth place and is about to get Kyrie Irving back for home games since New York City ended its vaccine mandate. If the Bulls do win Saturday, they would clinch the season series against Cleveland and win any tiebreaker.
The Bulls listed top scorer DeMar DeRozan as probable for the Cavs game after he sat out Thursday with a left adductor strain. Alex Caruso is also probable with a back contusion.
Cleveland has gone 4-5 since losing center Jarrett Allen to a broken finger and he is listed as out for Saturday. Rajon Rondo has been out since suffering a sprained ankle at the United Center on Mar. 12.
Opposing eyes on Ayo:
There hasn't been a big drop off, but Ayo Dosunmu's numbers are down in March from where they were in February. Hitting the rookie wall is always a popular theory, but Bulls coach Billy Donovan thinks it's more of a scouting wall.
"I don't think (early in the season), there was much information about him," Dosunmu said. "I think he is being scouted and this is really his growth as a player, how is he now going to be able to counter that? Because the more film that's out there on you, the more you're going to see different things and I think he's seen different things now more than maybe what he saw in February.
"This is where he's got to grow and we've talked about it. I still think he's playing hard, but the level of competition, the level of scouting, people playing him for a second and third time, understanding his game, understanding the way he is defensively and offensively, I think that's the biggest thing."
Dosunmu moved into the starting lineup on Jan. 15 when Lonzo Ball was sidelined with his knee injury. For the past three games, Donovan has started Alex Caruso at point guard, but Dosunmu did start in place of the injured DeMar DeRozan in New Orleans.
Bench blowup not for Bulls:
The Bulls don't seem very likely to have an angry confrontation on the bench, like the Heat did this week. Billy Donovan coached Miami's Udonis Haslem in college and talked about what it's like to have an aggressive personality like that in the locker room.
"I think everybody's got to be true to who they are," Donovan said. "When guys try to do things that are out of character with who they are, it doesn't come across as very authentic or genuine. Do we have guys who are going to respond the way Udonis has? Probably not.
"Are we going to have guys saying, 'Hey listen, we've got to get back in transition, we've got to do a better job in pick and roll, we've got to keep them off the backboard.' Yeah, we have guys who do that. Zach (LaVine) does it, DeMar (DeRozan) does it, Vuc (Nikola Vucevic) does it. That's who Udonis is, he's been like that since I was around him at 18 years old."
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