When the Bulls trailed by 15 at halftime of Sunday’s comeback win over the Memphis Grizzlies, coach Billy Donovan emphasized one key area of improvement: hand activity.
Donovan knows the easiest way to get his team back into any game is to force the opponent into errors. This is where the Bulls have thrived all season — picking off lazy passes, punching away loose balls, outsprinting opponents from one rim to the other.
The Bulls forced 16 turnovers in the second half, and the rest followed in stride as they completed a 44-point swing for a 128-107 win over the second-place team in the Western Conference. They scored 31 points off turnovers — an evergreen theme for a Bulls team that has tallied 144 points off turnovers in the last five games.
They’ll look to keep up the defensive intensity Tuesday night with a postseason berth at stake. The Bulls will clinch no worse than 10th place in the Eastern Conference — and a spot in the play-in tournament — with either a victory over the Atlanta Hawks at the United Center or an Orlando Magic loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers.
This Bulls team was structured with a defense-first mentality, and that was bolstered by the addition of defensive specialist Patrick Beverley after the All-Star break. The Bulls are eighth in the league with 7.8 steals per game on the season, and that number has leaped to 8.4 — second in the league — since the break.
“That’s how you get easy baskets,” guard Coby White said. “Get the stop, get the push, get the steal, get out in transition.”
The Bulls have become even more defensively disruptive since adding Beverley in February, but this isn’t a statistic led by one person — every player in the rotation is getting in on the action.
Alex Caruso led the team with three steals in Sunday’s win, and six other players recorded at least one steal. Nine players tallied a steal Friday in Charlotte and seven did it Wednesday against the Los Angeles Lakers.
“You’ve got to get stops first,” guard Zach LaVine said. “When you’ve got guys like Pat (Beverley) and AC (Caruso) flying around there, it allows me and DeMar (DeRozan) to play in the passing lanes a little bit more.”
There are two components to this — forcing a turnover, then scoring on it.
While the Bulls are fourth in the league since the break with 15.8 opponent turnovers per game, they’re scoring the most points off turnovers (21.7 per game). They aren’t forcing the most mistakes, but they are the most efficient after they’ve taken the ball away.
This makes sense with even a cursory look at the Bulls personnel. LaVine provides one of the most explosive presences in the league on the run, and he’s flanked by a litany of springy guards and forwards, including White, Ayo Dosunmu and fellow former dunk champion Derrick Jones Jr. Even frontcourt players such as Patrick Williams and Andre Drummond embrace the chance to run the court and dunk in transition.
The transition offense has seen a marked improvement over the last six weeks as the Bulls continue to learn how to run together more effectively.
“We’re doing a better job of spacing the floor,” Donovan said. “Before there were times where we’d get these steals and we’d run just to the basket. You’ve got to understand giving each other space to breathe a little bit to play. Guys are doing a good job of getting out wide and knowing, ‘OK, I need to run to the 3-point line because I don’t have an advantage.’”
This ability to force even the best teams into errors will be a key in the final four games of the season and in the postseason, when disrupting rhythm can decide the course of a game.
The Bulls are aware of their talent at knocking opponents off balance, but their efficiency in the open court will be even more crucial once they enter the single-elimination play-in tournament. After Sunday’s turnaround win fueled by turnovers, LaVine feels the Bulls know the formula for capitalizing on those errors.
“A lot of it is just making quick decisions,” LaVine said. “Throw the ball up and then read from there. If the defender’s there for you, kick it back. And if not, take the layup. Don’t make it complicated.”
