The Chicago Bulls came minutes away from advancing in the NBA Cup in-season tournament Friday night at the United Center.
With eight minutes remaining, the Bulls leveled the score with the Boston Celtics for the 10th and final time. But despite holding the top offensive team in the league within arm’s length for three quarters, the Bulls couldn’t close in a 138-129 defeat, their fifth clutch loss of the season.
The final stretch was packed with errors: giving up an offensive rebound off a Boston free throw, failing to convert on a Lonzo Ball steal. And the Celtics rattled off six 3-pointers — including a final dagger at the buzzer to improve their point differential for the NBA Cup tiebreaker — to crush any final hopes the Bulls held to advance to the quarterfinals.
Here are five takeaways from the loss.
1. The Bulls fell short in a 3-point shootout.
The formula for Friday’s matchup was fairly clear before either team stepped foot in the building: take (and hopefully make) a whole lot of 3-pointers.
The Celtics are the only team in the NBA averaging more than 50 attempts per game behind the arc. The Bulls aren’t far behind — averaging 42.9 attempts, third in the league — as they get the majority of their scoring from 3-point range. And despite a slow start, the Bulls were mostly able to keep up in this long-distance game.
Both teams took more than 50 3-pointers — 54 for the Celtics, 51 for the Bulls — as they leaned into their strengths. Ultimately, missed 3s made the difference. The Bulls eked out a slight advantage in other areas, including points in the paint (52-50) and on the fast break (17-16), while mostly keeping Boston off the glass.
But the Celtics made three more 3-pointers than the Bulls and won by nine. Their late 3-point burst was fueled by Payton Pritchard, who made five 3s in the fourth quarter to hold off the final surge from the Bulls. And without meaningful shooting from Coby White (1 of 7 on 3s) or Lonzo Ball (0 of 3), the Bulls didn’t have a final counter.
2. Nikola Vučević found his groove.
For most of the first half, Vučević was the only Bulls player contributing meaningfully to the long-range battle, knocking down 3s on four consecutive plays in the final two minutes of the first half. He said it was the first time he could remember hitting that many 3s in a row since he was a youth player in Europe.
Vučević finished with a season-high 32 points, including 6-of-9 shooting behind the arc, and added 11 rebounds to close out another double-double. He’s edging closer to Zach LaVine as the team’s leading scorer, less than a point behind LaVine’s average.
3. Lonzo Ball replaced Josh Giddey in the closing lineup.
Coach Billy Donovan originally planned to restrict Ball to 16 minutes in his second game back from a wrist injury as he continues a long-term ramp-up from a 2½-year absence. But Donovan ultimately played Ball for nearly 22 minutes, swapping him for Giddey in the closing rotation.
Donovan said he felt confident about Ball after a strong first half and consulted with both Ball and the medical team before changing his plan. Although Ball struggled with his shot, his ability to match up defensively with players such as Jayson Tatum was crucial for the Bulls to slow the Celtics offense.
The Bulls continue to move away from closing with Giddey, who played only 24 minutes in a lackluster defensive night, though he tallied eight rebounds and nine assists.
4. Torrey Craig and Talen Horton-Tucker anchored the reserves.
With must-win stakes on the line, Donovan opted for experience over young talent against the Celtics. Craig and Horton-Tucker anchored the bench unit, providing a scoring boost as the starting backcourt faltered. Julian Phillips didn’t crack the rotation until the fourth quarter, while Dalen Terry played less than eight minutes.
Horton-Tucker simply couldn’t miss, finishing 4-for-4 behind the arc as he scored six of his 16 points in the fourth quarter. Craig added an important defensive boost alongside Ball while also hitting three 3-pointers. The pair combined for 35% of the Bulls’ 3-point scoring, outpacing every starter besides Vučević.
5. How things stand in the NBA Cup.
The Bulls are officially eliminated from the NBA Cup after finishing 2-2 in the group stage, an improvement from last year’s 0-4 showing.
But beating the Bulls did not clinch a quarterfinal berth for the Celtics, who lost the head-to-head tiebreaker to the Atlanta Hawks. The Celtics will advance as the Eastern Conference wild card only if the New York Knicks lose to the Orlando Magic and the Detroit Pistons lose to the Milwaukee Bucks by six or more points Tuesday.
The Bulls will await the final group stage results Tuesday before they are assigned two additional regular-season games — one home, one away — in the second week of December.
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