With 10 regular-season games left and the No. 9 seed in the Eastern Conference looking like the Bulls’ most likely outcome, it would be nice if coach Billy Donovan could cut back on some of the heavy minutes he has put on players and start preparing for the play-in tournament.
But as Monday showed, this team usually doesn’t allow Donovan to have nice things.
In yet another lackluster performance against the lowly Wizards (14-58), the Bulls (34-38) slept through most of the first half, only waking up when it was too late in an eventual 107-105 loss.
Rock bottom? Not really. The Bulls also have lost twice to the 12-win Pistons this season.
“Offensively, really for the entire game, it was not a good night for us, the way we shot the ball,” Donovan said. “We don’t have the luxury to [play down to the competition]. We haven’t earned or deserved to be thinking that way.”
Mathematically, the Bulls were still in the running Monday to try to push the Heat and 76ers in the No. 7 and 8 spots, respectively. But it was a long shot at best.
In the other direction at No. 10 are the Hawks, who looked lifeless a few weeks ago but got a surprising win over the Celtics on Monday to pull within 1½ games of the Bulls.
“It sucks because all these games matter — they count,” said veteran forward DeMar DeRozan, who finished with a game-high 27 points. “You want to be playing good basketball toward this part of the season, and the circumstances we’re under, everything matters that much more.”
A rock and a hard place? This is Bulls basketball.
“If it gets to a point clearly where, OK, we can’t move up, we can’t move down, we’re locked in where we’re at, [then] there will without a doubt be discussions with [top Bulls executives], medical and the players just in terms of what makes sense,” Donovan said of the final 10 games. “I think there is a little bit of a balance where these guys get in such a rhythm of playing games that I don’t know if you want to be, ‘Hey, we’re going to take three games off here and we’ve got you a week under his belt.’ Everything is full steam ahead in terms of can we get better and continue to play better.”
In the first quarter against the Wizards, they couldn’t have played much worse, allowing them a 15-0 start right out of the gate. The Bulls aren’t strangers to digging themselves into big holes, but a no-show right from the opening tip against one of the worst teams in the NBA felts unacceptable.
The Bulls finally took a two-point lead in the third quarter, but the Wizards had an answer and then some, building a seven-point lead with just over four minutes left.
The Bulls did get it down to a one-point game with 9.1 seconds left, but two free throws by Corey Kispert gave the Wizards a three-point lead with 7.6 seconds left.
Bulls guard Coby White made his two free throws, and then the Wizards sent Justin Champagnie to the line. He missed his second free throw, and when Bulls guard Alex Caruso pulled down the rebound, he found DeRozan sprinting up the court. DeRozan threw up a 44-foot prayer that missed.