Bulls vs Bobcats

[Pierzynski 12]

What a comeback by the Bulls.

Edited November 3, 2005 by BMac41

[jenksd]

Hell of a comeback, if Kareem Rush is the Bobcats go to guy, they are absolutely f***ed.

 

Kareem Rush may be the worst starting player in the NBA

Edited November 3, 2005 by jenksd

[Steve9347]

we're pretty f***ed if we can't score down low. Songaila fed Chandler beautifully down low a few times, and he wasn't able to finish, turning the ball over after putting it on the floor.

 

we can only hit limitless amounts of threes so many times at the end of games... it was nice to get the win, though.

 

i gotta say pax kicked ass in picking up songaila, i want a jersey, if basketball jerseys didnt look so dumb on white guys!

[Kyyle23]

This makes me feel better

 

BOSTON -- Larry Brown exited quickly and quietly as the buzzer sounded at the end of a disastrous overtime, putting his head down and checking the top button on his dark blue sports coat as he shuffled toward the locker room to review everything that had gone wrong.

 

To start with, there were 15 missed free throws, 10 fewer offensive rebounds, 22 turnovers and a 10-point deficiency in second-chance points. But those were merely the most egregious of the numbers, and a far larger problem was exposed as the Knicks scored just six points to Boston's 20 in the final five minutes of Brown's debut game, a 114-100 overtime loss Wednesday night to the Celtics.

 

"I think we got discouraged a little bit," Brown said in the hallway outside New York's locker room moments later. "In overtime, they made every hustle play."

 

Discouraged only begins to tell the story. Discombobulated, disheveled, disheartened, disgusting. How many dis words does one need to display to properly diss a team that completely crumbled when it came time to assert themselves?

 

Most troubling for the Knicks was the way their best players were outshone by their counterparts. The best center on the court was Mark Blount, not Eddy Curry. The best point guard was Delonte West, not Stephon Marbury. The guys making the big plays in overtime were Paul Pierce, Ricky Davis and Raef LaFrentz, not Matt Barnes, Davis and Jamal Crawford.

 

Especially not Crawford.

 

The shooting guard who learned before tipoff that he had lost his starting job to Quentin Richardson found himself playing in crunch time because Richardson was too sore to be fully effective. Crawford threw away a pass and had a shot blocked during a 39-second span of overtime in which Boston's lead went from seven to 13, ending all doubt. But those poor plays were only a sampling from Crawford, whose out-of-control shot selection and slipshod decision making will have to be one of the first things Brown tries to rein in.

 

Crawford ended up with six turnovers, while Marbury had five and shot just 5-for-12 from the foul line. Curry also missed seven free throws, and he repeatedly failed to step outside and guard Blount as the Celtics' center kept hitting jumpers.

 

Crawford acknowledged that Boston had made all the hustle plays, while Marbury defended the Knicks by saying all their mistakes were correctable.

 

But it came down to this: A win was within the Knicks' reach, and it would have been a tremendous ego boost if they had started the season by bringing something positive back to New York for the home opener. Instead, they are already saddled with a losing record that seems befitting -- at least at this point -- for a team that simply broke down when confronted with its first tough test. That's why Brown was so stonefaced as he made his hasty retreat, perhaps becoming even more aware of the fact that he's now in charge of a team so accustomed to losing that it seemed to come naturally to them in overtime.

 

That sounds like the reason why Crawford was traded and the reason that Curry frustrated everyone in Chicago.

[Balta1701]

This makes me feel better

That sounds like the reason why Crawford was traded and the reason that Curry frustrated everyone in Chicago.

If Curry couldn't learn how to play the right way from Skiles, I just can't see how Larry Brown will make much of a difference either. Larry's a great coach, but he's not so far ahead of Skiles right now that I think he'll be able to get Eddy to jump either.

[Kyyle23]

If Curry couldn't learn how to play the right way from Skiles, I just can't see how Larry Brown will make much of a difference either.  Larry's a great coach, but he's not so far ahead of Skiles right now that I think he'll be able to get Eddy to jump either.

 

I feel the same way. And actually, I am curious about whether it was Skiles impact that made Curry better last year, or his contract situation that made him better. It should be interesting to monitor how Brown deals with Curry, and vice versa, now that Curry got paid.