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Bulls survive against James-less Cavaliers 108 - 109
April 8, 2010
The Bulls got a gift from the Cleveland Cavaliers and almost gave it away. Derrick Rose had 24 points, Kirk Hinrich had 23 and Luol Deng finished with 22 points and 10 rebounds as the Bulls defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers 109-108 Thursday to move into a tie with the Toronto Raptors for the eighth playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. Both teams are 38-40, both play on the road Friday, then they meet in Toronto Sunday for a key late-season matchup. Joakim Noah joined the scoring parade with 17 points and added 15 rebounds. "The basketball gods were with us,'' Noah said. "We cannot get too high. We cannot have any let down. We have to go into New Jersey (Friday) and play our game. That's a team that beat us already." Mo Williams had a season-high 35 points for Cleveland, making six of 11 3-pointers. He also had 10 assists, tying Rose for game honors. Cleveland coach Mike Brown, knowing his team had the best record in the NBA clinched, chose to sit all-star forward LeBron James rather than risk the kind of late-season injuries that have hit Chris Bosh of Toronto and Andrew Bogut of Milwaukee. But Williams took over the scoring leadership of the team and nearly pulled the Cavaliers (61-18) to a road victory.
The Cavaliers are going to play either the Bulls or the Raptors in the first round of the playoffs, but that fact did not play into Thursday's contest. "It doesn't matter who we play,'' Williams said. "We have to play somebody. Whoever gets us, we'll be ready to play. We locked up what we wanted to lock up, guys are get rested now, but we'll go out and compete and try to get the win." The game's final points were scored by Bulls center Joakim Noah on a tip with 1:21 left in the game. After that, the Cavaliers missed six shots (two of them blocked) and the Bulls amazingly missed four consecutive free throws, two by Deng and two by Rose with 1.3 seconds left. But when Rose missed his second free throw, Noah tipped the rebound out to midcourt and the game was over. The Bulls, who scored just 74 points in a loss to Milwaukee on Tuesday, shot 51.8 percent, making 44 of 85 shots. The shooting numbers were in stark contrast to Tuesday's performance. "We attacked more, we did not settle for jumpers,'' Bulls coach Vinny Del Negro said. " Going to the rim made the difference in the 2nd half."
The Cavaliers played without James (general soreness), Shaquille O'Neal (sprained thumb) and Delonte West (lower back spasms). Before the game, Brown explained that James would not play because of "bumps and bruises", giving the Bulls more hope of a much-needed win. They started the game 37-40 and one-half game behind the Raptors. Jawad Williams started in place of James but scored just three points with four rebounds in 23 minutes. To give an idea of the competitiveness of the game, the lead changed hands 20 times. The Bulls led by 12 points in the third quarter, but the Cavaliers regained the lead two minutes into the fourth quarter. The Bulls led 96-89 in the fourth quarter when Williams and well-traveled Jamario Moon combined for 11 consecutive points. Williams hit back-to-back 3-pointers while double-covered in that stretch, and the Cavaliers led 100-96 with 4:45 remaining. Those two shots caused teammate James to dance on the sidelines behind the Cavaliers bench.
"He was terrific,' Brown said. "He did a nice, nice job of not only looking for his shot, and being aggressive, but also looking to get others involved." The loss was the first in the last 31 games for the Cavaliers against teams with losing records. The Cavaliers are 1-2 without James this season. The Cavaliers also lost the services of forward Antawn Jamison midway through the fourth quarter when he appeared to twist his ankle severely. Jamison finished with 23 points.