3-pointers: Breaking down the Bulls' defeat

Jan. 23--The Bulls dropped to 24-18 with their Friday road loss to the Celtics. Here are three observations:

The Bulls had a season-low 11 assists

Part of this is because the Celtics aggressively deny wings and force turnovers. They did so successfully against the Bulls, scoring 26 points off 20 turnovers.

Part, also, is because the Bulls again failed to recognize favorable matchups. At one point, a timid Tony Snell had the much smaller Isaiah Thomas on him and never took a shot.

So the Bulls resorted to mostly isolation scoring from Derrick Rose and Jimmy Butler.

"Anytime we tried moving the ball too much they were getting into the passing lanes," coach Fred Hoiberg said. "So the thing that was working was ball screens in the middle and that's when we were in attack mode and that's when good things happened for us."

Nikola Mirotic looks completely lost

The second-year forward missed six of seven shots with three turnovers. That included the critical turnover off a nifty pass from Rose that would've given the Bulls their only lead with just under 5 minutes remaining.

Hoiberg has been Mirotic's biggest defender but even Hoiberg sounded out of answers afterward.

Rose and Butler are playing well and the Bulls are still losing

Butler is averaging an Eastern Conference best 26.3 points in January. Rose is averaging 19.7 pts on 48.6% shooting. Yet Bulls are 6-6 on month.

That's trouble, particularly with the schedule about to turn even more difficult and a long trip looming.