After coming up short again, what now for the Bulls?
CHICAGO — For a team and a coach that pride themselves on tenacity and toughness, the Bulls' season ended Thursday night with a soft whimper.
LeBron James wasn't nearly as overwhelming as he could've been, and the Cleveland Cavaliers played the entire second half without an injured Kyrie Irving. And yet his absence had no bearing on the 94-73 outcome, as the Cavs clinched the Eastern Conference semifinals series over the Bulls 4-2.
James' teams improved to 4-0 against the Bulls in postseason series by dominating nearly all facets of the game. Everything from loose balls to second-chance opportunities to three-point shooting favored the Cavaliers, leaving the Bulls shocked and somber in the losing locker room.
"It could've been anyone (who knocked Chicago from the postseason)," Derrick Rose said, refusing to add significance to LeBron's flawless mark. "Just frustrating to be out of the playoffs, period."
While seemingly a distant memory, the Bulls were up 2-1 in the series. They had Game 4 at the United Center with a chance to maintain homecourt advantage. It was a chance they'd been waiting for for years, given Rose's history with injuries. But they blew a seven-point lead entering the fourth quarter, lost any sense of offense and eventually fell on a thrilling James buzzer-beater from the corner. The series flipped on James' make.
"I guess, yeah," said Joakim Noah, admitting that maybe the Bulls had missed their shot. "The reality is there's no more basketball. There's no more practices. There's no more meetings with this group. That's always hard and always take a little time to digest."
Considering the context of the Bulls' season, the effort on Thursday wasn't entirely surprising, though. This season's Bulls were plagued by injuries, and they struggled to find consistency, whether it was on the offensive end or in terms of effort. They were burned in both capacities in Game 6.
From the 6:38 mark of the second quarter to the 6:22 mark of the third quarter, the Bulls scored six points. A 40-38 lead swung to a 60-46 deficit, and that's precisely when the Bulls' season was cooked.
"The second quarter's been a problem for us in the whole series," Tom Thibodeau said. "That took a lot out of us, but I thought the fight was there in the third quarter. We had a shot at it again, but we couldn't get it really to within striking distance."
That was because Matthew Dellavedova (19 points) and Tristan Thompson (13 points, 17 rebounds) outplayed their counterparts in Rose and Pau Gasol. The Bulls could do nothing to stop the torrent of 12 three-pointers Cleveland buried, and had even more trouble keeping Thompson off the glass.
His energy was apparent all series, but it was magnified while the Bulls fruitlessly tried to cut into a double-digit lead. His six offensive rebounds helped Cleveland double up Chicago on second-chance points (24-12) and its 53-32 advantage on the glass was jarring. The team that owned the rebounding edge won every game of the series.
Rose's 14 points were insignificant compared to the three backbreaking three-pointers Dellavedova hit in the second half. The Bulls continually doubled away from Dellavedova, who proved he's more than just an irritating leg-clamper.
J.R. Smith sandwiched two 3-pointers, himself, late in the third between nine points from Rose and Jimmy Butler. Each Bulls' response was either met with a momentum-killing three or a dispiriting offensive rebound. Gasol's return from a hamstring injury that kept him out Games 4 and 5 was rendered useless.
A largely insignificant second half expedited myriad questions facing the Bulls this offseason. The most pressing, and the one that could alter the course of the franchise, concerned Thibodeau's future in Chicago. Tension boiled all season between the gruff fifth-year coach and management over various players' minutes. There were other sticking points, but that's been an issue throughout his tenure because of the way in which injuries defined the Bulls' last few seasons.
"Until they tell me I'm not, I expect to be here," he said. "That's the way I'm approaching it."
If he needs an advocate within the locker room, he has one in the franchise's most important player.
"We grew a bond together with him being on USA basketball. Him coming out to LA to check up on me after my surgeries. I think we really have a bond. It's not up to my decision, but I love him as a coach," Rose said. "I can't say nothing bad about him. Man knows my family. I know his family. So the decision is not my decision. If it was up to me he'll be back."
The most encouraging development of the season was that Rose ended it healthy. Say what you want about Thibodeau's hard-charging nature, but he wasn't dealt a full deck. The Bulls must address Thibodeau, Butler's potential path to restricted free agency, but along with Gasol, the team's core remains intact.
"I got a baseline now. I'm healthy," Rose said, sounding relieved. "I'll go into the summer with a gameplan, certain things to work on. I feel like I'm gonna push myself the hardest I've ever pushed myself in my career. Just see where it takes me."
NBA PLAYOFFS: Best of the second round
