Chicago Bulls lose 128-117 to New York Knicks — and Andre Drummond exits with an ankle injury
At times, the Chicago Bulls still play like a team getting to know one another.
For a flash in the second quarter of Tuesday’s 128-117 loss to the New York Knicks, it seemed as if they didn’t know each other at all.
Andre Drummond poked the ball free on the perimeter. Torrey Craig snatched up the loose ball and took off toward the hoop. Without a single Knicks defender in the area, Craig tossed the ball off the backboard as he bounded toward the rim.
And — inexplicably, infuriatingly — Drummond followed.
The pair collided at the rim, the ball bouncing everywhere except into the net as Drummond and Craig crashed into each other and then to the ground. That snapshot of both players with their hand on the ball, eyes wide, captured the truth of this Bulls season: always close to moments of joy, always stumbling just a second too soon.
Coach Billy Donovan called a timeout immediately, laying into Craig and his teammates until the players urged him: We need to move on.
“To me, it was just really disappointing,” Donovan said. “There was a lot of self-induced things that I thought we contributed to — not only that play but other plays that maybe weren’t as loud as that — but that play was disappointing to me.”
Craig shrugged off his decision to attempt a flashy play, accepting blame but adding he wasn’t bothered by the play after it happened.
But guard Coby White acknowledged that in a game riddled with miscues and miscommunication, the Bulls gave themselves little room to succeed.
“We did some really dumb stuff tonight,” White said. “Everybody one through five, not just Craig, so we’re not going to sit here and single him out. We’re a team.
“It was all self-induced. We all know that as a team, just the little stuff, the details, it’s too late in the season to be having those types of lapses. We’ve got to get our (stuff) together for sure.”
The flubbed dunk was the embarrassing lowlight of a dismal loss for the Bulls. But what happened on the ensuing play was far worse: Drummond hustled back on defense, attempted to rebound an awry shot and in the process landed on an opponent’s foot.
Drummond immediately hopped to the sideline and flopped onto his stomach in evident pain, rolling over to hold his left ankle. He was removed from the court in a wheelchair and left the United Center before the end of a game wearing a boot and utilizing a mobility scooter.
The severity of the injury is unclear. But with three games remaining in the regular season — and just a week until the play-in tournament begins — the Bulls can’t afford to lose their backup big man.
Photos: New York Knicks 128, Chicago Bulls 117
It’s nothing new for the Bulls to be short-handed. Ayo Dosunmu missed Tuesday’s game with a right thigh bruise that could affect his availability the rest of the week. And the Bulls have been without Zach LaVine and Patrick Williams for much of the season.
But losing Drummond would strip the Bulls of their versatility in size, forcing Donovan to either increase starting center Nikola Vučević’s minutes or rely on undersized forwards such as Javonte Green and Craig. Donovan also experimented Tuesday with plugging in undrafted rookie Adama Sanogo for Drummond’s minutes. Sanogo recorded one rebound and one turnover in five minutes.
Even with Drummond, the Bulls defense struggled to slow Jalen Brunson and the Knicks offense. Brunson dropped 15 points in the first quarter and finished with 45 on 13-for-24 shooting.
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The Bulls couldn’t counter with high-volume shooting of their own despite the efforts of White, who broke the single-season franchise record for 3-pointers after poking away a steal and splashing a 3 to close the first half.
White surpassed LaVine’s record with 205 3-pointers on the season. He finished with 24 points, while DeMar DeRozan led the Bulls in scoring with 34 points and Vučević added 26.
This was the second of three matchups between the Bulls and Knicks in the final six games. The Bulls won the first of those games 108-100 on Friday at the United Center.
Despite Tuesday’s loss, the Bulls (37-42) maintained a one-game lead for the ninth seed in the Eastern Conference after the Atlanta Hawks lost in double overtime to the Miami Heat. The Bulls also own the season tiebreaker versus the Hawks (36-43), so their magic number is two to clinch the ninth seed and home court in next Wednesday’s play-in tournament opener.
After road games Thursday and Friday against the Detroit Pistons and Washington Wizards — the bottom two teams in the East — the Bulls will end the regular season at noon Sunday at Madison Square against the Knicks.
