The Chicago Bulls took advantage of Luka Doncic’s injured absence to post a regular season best of 115-144 on 63.5% shooting from the field.
DeMar DeRozan led their offense with 28 points, 9 rebounds and 5 assists; seconded by center Nikola Vucevic with 20 points, 8 rebounds and 4 baskets.
“You won’t always pitch like this, but when you do, you have to appreciate it. The Mavericks went crazy after the back to back and very late, but you have to take advantage of it. And we did it,” acknowledged Zach LaVine.
Virtually all contributed five additional double-digit players to the win: Ayo Dosunmu (17); Patrick Williams, Derrick Jones Jr. and the aforementioned LaVine with 16 points each; and veteran Goran Dragic with 14.
«We scored 144 in a very distributed match. Zach, Vuce and LaVine are selfless players who, when they don’t have the ball, move it and this allows teammates to get into the game” explained Billy Donovan.
In the Mavs everything went wrong from the beginning. They came from back to back after a tough matchup against Milwaukee; their plane was delayed and they landed around 3am, their main star unavailable along with the additional casualties of Josh Green and Maxi Kleber.
Spencer Dinwiddie was its best exponent with 27 points; separated by Christian Wood and JaVale McGee with 21 and 18 points respectively.
(Cover photo: Quinn Harris/Getty Images)
