Feb. 26--The Bulls dropped to 36-22 with their home loss to the Hornets. Here are three observations.
The Bulls are no longer an elite defensive team.
Can they be? Maybe. Are they currently? No.
Against the Hornets, the Bulls surrendered 17 fast-break points, lost the rebounding battle and crumbled in the fourth quarter with the game on the line. Jimmy Butler noticed.
"Defense is all effort," he said. "It's if we want to play or not. We haven't been playing too much defense all year, just offense. And look where it got us."
Even Tom Thibodeau, who has been, well, defensive about the defense, noted the second-half struggles.
"We are still capable of playing good defense," he said. "I thought the defense in the first half was very good; in the second half we didn't finish our defense as well as we could have. That is something we have to continue to work on and improve on, figure out the rotation a little bit. You want the fourth quarter to be the best quarter, and obviously it wasn't the case for us."
The Bulls must play with offensive pace.
This is where Derrick Rose will be missed the most. For all the hand-wringing over Rose's play, he often advanced the ball quickly up the court with either a pass or strong dribble. Too often against the Hornets, the Bulls were in late-clock situations and managed just five fast-break points, three until the final, meaningless possession.
This isn't Aaron Brooks fault. He has to adjust to being a starting point guard again. But the Bulls need to try to force the tempo to get easy baskets and continue spreading the floor with shooting rather than getting bogged down in halfcourt isolation situations.
Tony Snell continued his hot 3-point shooting but got just four attempts as the Bulls went 3-for-17 from beyond the arc.
Pau Gasol is even more important than before.
The veteran center posted his league-leading 38th double-double with 25 points and 13 rebounds. If the Bulls are going to be bogged down in halfcourt situations, as they were often last year after Rose went down, Gasol's scoring prowess will be needed.
"We all have to do as much as we can," Gasol said. "It depends on the game. I just try to contribute as much as I can without forcing anything. Just play the game the right way. We all have to pick up the slack a little bit."
