Rockets 119, Bulls 113: Bulls fall short despite Tre Jones’ career night

They almost had it.

The Chicago Bulls had every chance to eke out a win against the Houston Rockets, but lost their chance late, ultimately losing 119-113.

Josh Giddey (hamstring), Coby White (calf injury management) and Zach Collins (toe) remained out, but that didn’t seem to affect the Bulls in the slightest. For all they add to the Bulls’ offense, their penchant for producing turnovers can be costly. Led by Tre Jones‘ career-high with 34 points, plus seven assists to two turnovers, the Bulls were able to hang with, and in some cases even beat out the Rockets in the four factors.

The Bulls did an excellent job keeping the Rockets, who own the highest offensive rebounding rate of all time, to 12 offensive rebounds and 15 second-chance points. That’s still too many against most teams, but the Bulls actually outrebounded them on the offensive glass, with 14 and 17 second-chance points.

They had seven turnovers compared to the Rockets’ nine. The Bulls attempted 23 free throws compared to the Rockets’ 29. The Bulls had six more field goal attempts than Houston.

These are the controllable areas that Billy Donovan consistently harps on. Against one of the better teams in the Western Conference, albeit one that had lost three of four games, they did that.

Sometimes, as well as you can execute on those things, it doesn’t matter if you don’t make shots. And the Bulls had a 50.0 effective field goal percentage, compared to Houston’s 55.1.

But the Bulls got some help beyond the arc, beating Houston by 15 points from deep. The Bulls didn’t shoot it well as a team — only 12-of-37, 32 percent. But Jones connected on five himself, a new career-high.

With the loss, the Bulls fall to 18-21. They remain the 10th seed in the East.

Tune into the CHGO Bulls postgame live:

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Up next: Despite a grueling stretch of 13 games in the next 23 days leading up to the trade deadline, including the Condensation Game rescheduling, the Bulls face a soft few games of Utah (14-25) and Brooklyn (11-26) twice and the Los Angeles Clippers (16-23) before the competition picks up again. 

The Jazz own the league’s 28th-ranked point differential this season (-8.1), struggling on both sides of the ball, primarily defensively, where they are dead last. Even though they’re coming off a nice win in Cleveland, they are 2-6 in their last two weeks with a -12.7 differential. Their 55-point loss to the Charlotte Hornets on January 10 is doing the heavy lifting there. 

Keyonte George is having a Most Improved caliber season. Lauri Markkanen is back to his All-Star ways. Will Hardy is a phenomenal coach. But the Bulls should be able to win this one, and avenge their 150-147 double OT loss back in November. 

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Have the Bulls lost their biggest strength?

In order for the Bulls to become an efficient offense, they have to circumvent their half-court scoring issues by playing in transition as much as possible. While that was, at one point, a strength, over recent weeks, it has not come to fruition. Since December 1st, only 15.6 percent of the Bulls’ total offense has come in transition, which ranks 16th in the NBA. That was boosted in their win over the Dallas Mavericks, in which they scored 38 fast-break points. But in the games prior to December, they were getting on the break 17.5 percent of the time, which ranked fourth in the league. 

For a team that wants to hang its hat on its ability to get into the open court, that is a scary number to consider. 

“Shots within the first seven seconds are the highest percentage shots you’re going to get. And then every seven seconds that goes off the clock, the percentages go down,” Donovan said.

It’s not just playing fast that allows the Bulls to get transition layups, but the tempo and thrust that puts them in position to create a cascade of opportunities for high-value shots. Getting paint touches forces defenses into rotation to take away open shots at the rim. That leads to free throw attempts, or sprayout three opportunities for the Bulls, which are critical because they don’t have many players that can break down offenses and get their own shots up off-the-dribble.

“How much can you generate penetration to the basket, to the rim, to the paint, which is generally where you kick out your sprays, your open threes come all that kind of stuff,” Donovan said. 

In order to boost their transition numbers, a few key things need to happen. Generally speaking, getting stops is critical, because they don’t take the ball out from under the basket on makes. 

Transition is usually a result of turning teams over, but the Bulls are dead last in opponent turnover rate. Finally, they need to do a better job boxing out and preventing offensive rebounds, which take them out of position to jumpstart the offense, but the Bulls rank 15th in opponent offensive rebound rate since the turn of the year. 

“We don’t necessarily generate a lot of turnovers, so we’re not getting out for easy ones,” Donovan said. “The other part of it, too, is the offensive rebounding and the fouling, but if you look at our shot profile in terms of the shots that we’re generating, we’re generating really, really good shots. We get to the paint quite a bit, and we get to the rim quite a bit, but that’s only part of it.”

Any little improvements could go a long way towards helping with the margins as slim as they are. 

— Will Gottlieb

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Jones hitting a career-high…four threes! Woooo, baby! We talked in Pregame about Jones and Ayo Dosunmu needing to step up tonight with the Bulls missing both Giddey and White. Ayo had a surprisingly quiet night, and Donovan shaved off his usual allotment of minutes. But have no fear, Jones is here. Shoutout to him for also getting to the line repeatedly, something the Bulls have been struggling to do in their recent stretch of games.

Donovan continues to favor lineups with size in the absence of Giddey and White. Nikola Vucevic, Jalen Smith and Matas Buzelis were on the floor together for large stretches. Smith continues to show his value to this team. Will other teams see something similar and call the Bulls about him between now and February 5th? 

I’m out of things to say about Patrick Williams. Another night, another *crickets* performance. His field goals made, by game, over his last five: 0, 1, 2, 1, 0. It’s almost poetic!

— Matt Peck

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For the past couple of years, the Bulls have played the Rockets tough in Houston. This game is no different.

Jones had a good game and they needed it. He finally woke up from the three-point line and was passing the bawl very well. 

I thought Dalen Terry had one of his best games this season. The pass he dropped off in the paint was nasty and he hit his three. 

Jalen Smith is carving out a nice role for himself. His toughness, athleticism and rim deterrence have been really solid. 

I want more Buzelis. That’s it and that’s all. 

Patrick Lee Williams is USDA Grade-A Organic ass.

— Big Dave