HOUSTON – It continued to elude the Bulls.
Twice now in the last few weeks, the .500 mark mockingly stared down at them, waiting to be grabbed, only to watch the Bulls stumble and let it slip through their fingertips.
The Clippers did it with offensive finesse a few weeks ago, and on Thursday the up-and-coming Rockets did it with physicality and a certain amount of bully ball to them, taking the visiting team into the alley and coming out alone with the 127-117 victory.
Made a lot easier by removing DeMar DeRozan from the game.
With 6:02 left in the third quarter and the Bulls (34-36) down 84-75, DeRozan appeared to throw a left leg in the direction of a dribbling Jalen Green, sending Green to the ground and tempers flaring up.
As DeRozan was walking away from the scene of the crime, Rockets antagonist Dillon Brooks started letting DeRozan know how he felt about him, walking up on the Bulls veteran. DeRozan whipped around as the two grabbed each other, and then the scuffling began.
Bulls security did eventually try to separate Brooks and Torrey Craig, sending all three involved down to the floor, but it also put an end to things escalating.
That also sent the officials to the review table where it was determined that DeRozan’s foul was changed to a Flagrant 2, booting him from the game, and Brooks was also sent to the locker room for, well, likely being Dillon Brooks.
“I was surprised just from the simple fact that I was trying to hedge out and just be aggressive, obviously bumped him, but if you look at it I kind of tripped into it,” DeRozan said of the foul getting upgraded. “I’m not dumb. These days it’s just so hard to tell when you go back and look at a review. It wasn’t anything I was trying to do intentionally.”
Going back at Brooks, however, was very intentional.
DeRozan lives by a code and in his estimation, Brooks crossed it.
“Just walking up on me in any type of way,” DeRozan said of why he reacted so angrily. “I don’t play the walking up on somebody when their back is turned. Nah, that’s just not a thing we do. I walked away from the situation after the foul. I just felt like it’s an issue walking up on any man from behind.”
With the “King of the Fourth” abdicating his throne, that left the Bulls without their leading scorer, and more importantly, their closer.
And while there was fight into the final quarter, there just wasn’t enough in DeRozan’s absence.
Anytime the Bulls did something positive to try and get momentum back it was met, and then some. Nikola Vucevic cut the deficit to eight on a solid eight-foot jumper, but then watched the young, athletic Rockets go one a run that included an Aaron Holiday lay-up, another dunk from Green, a Jabri Smith Jr. lay-in, and then a Green three-pointer.
The Bulls became a boat that had lost its rudder.
Sure, there was one last-minute charge when Dalen Terry tipped in a basket to cut it to seven with 1:31 left, but Jock Landale put the game on ice with the hoop and the harm, completing the three-point play and ending the latest charge for .500.
Coach Billy Donovan thought it was a lack of physicality by his team right from the get-go, as well as getting upset by a lack of fouls being called.
“It can sometimes get frustrating, but we have to control ourselves and focus in on what we’ve got to do in those moments,” Donovan added.
That’s also why DeRozan apologized to his teammates afterward.
“I felt bad not being out there for my team,” DeRozan said. “That’s what I’m more frustrated with more than anything.”