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Only one thing stood between the San Antonio Spurs and a win to close out the rodeo road trip last night in Chicago.
A 6-3, 190 lb. point guard named Derrick Rose.
Rose scored a career-high 42 points against the Spurs using every trick in his arsenal no matter who was defending him, and it was more than enough to give the Spurs their 10th loss of the season 99-109.
While Tony Parker did his best to carry the team offensively, scoring 26 points, Manu Ginobili struggled, scoring 16 points on 6-of-18 from the field and making just one of his five three-point attempts.
For the spurs, Gary Neal scored 16, Tim Duncan had 14 and Richard Jefferson finished with 12 points.
Luol Deng scored19 and Carlos Boozer added 15 points for the Bulls.
With the loss, the Spurs are now 46-10 on the season, six games ahead of the Dallas Mavericks.
In Retrospect
Jeff Garcia spoke to Marco of Horns to the Hardwood before the game and asked him if people are sleeping on the Bulls in the East.
“Everyone is enamored with the Heat and the Celtics. The Heat get the attention for having 2 superstars and one good player on their team. The Celtics get the attention because they’re really good, and because Boston is ESPN’s child. The Bulls sit at 37-16, two games back of the 1 seed in the East. And the biggest reason teams are sleeping on the Bulls is because you really don’t know how good Derrick Rose is until you see him everyday. He’s really picked up the load with Noah and Boozer out for extended stretches, and will carry them deep into the post-season.”
In Black & White
Rose in bloom spells Spurs’ doom (San Antonio Express-News)
Derrick Rose’s career-best helps Bulls beat Spurs (Chicago Sun-Times)
Quoteable
“To date we have a good record but nothing of importance has been accomplished yet.” – Gregg Popovich
Fantasy Focus
I don’t think I have to waste any keystrokes talking about Rose and his performance. Plus if you don’t have him on your roster, you aren’t getting him without a trade.
Gary Neal seems to have bounced back from his slump, averaging 13.5 points his last four games. He scored 16 points against Chicago and made four of his five three-point attempts.
Tweeting the game
The Michael Jordan Award for BEASTIN’ goes to Chicago’s Derrick Rose dropping a career-high 42 pts + 8 asts vs NBA best #spurs. Sick. -@therealcabbie.
Derrick Rose- first Bulls player since Michael Jordan to score 40+ points against the Spurs. Rose, career-high 42 points in the Bulls win. – @Buccigross.
The Four Factors
