The opening minutes of Wednesday’s loss to the Milwaukee Bucks were an echo of an all-too-familiar pattern for the Chicago Bulls.
Even without Giannis Antetokounmpo, the Bucks put the Bulls on their heels within minutes, and the offense had no answers. DeMar DeRozan missed two shots at the start of a 3-for-12 night, Patrick Williams and Patrick Beverley clanked 3-pointers off the iron and Zach LaVine made only 1 of 6 attempts from long range.
By the end of the first quarter, the Bulls had scored only 21 points as they shot a brutal 9-for-24 (37.5%) from the field.
The 105-92 loss that followed the sluggish start locked in the Bulls as the 10th seed in the Eastern Conference, meaning they will travel to face the ninth seed — likely the Toronto Raptors — for a play-in tournament game next Wednesday.
And with the stakes raised in a single-elimination game, the Bulls know they can’t repeat the same first-quarter weakness if they hope to stay alive in the postseason.
“You don’t want to ease your way in at all,” LaVine said. “Obviously we don’t try to get down. We’re coming out playing hard, but sometimes teams make shots, they get certain possessions, they get in a rhythm.
“I just think we’ve got to be the more aggressive team, offensively and defensively, especially during the play-in. You’ve got to be more desperate than the other team.”
After 80 games, the Bulls still are struggling to fix a fundamental problem in their offense — how to shake themselves out of a funk.
The final week of the regular season has featured a series of slow starts — falling into a 15-point hole Sunday against the Memphis Grizzlies, starting 2-for-9 Tuesday against the Atlanta Hawks and opening 2-for-13 Wednesday.
This isn’t particularly new. The Bulls average 26 first-quarter points, second-lowest in the league according to Swish analytics. They’re able to offset these low-scoring starts with their defense, resulting in a plus-0.7 average first-quarter margin. But when the Bulls open a game even colder than normal, it’s easy for them to slip quickly behind.
Sometimes the Bulls wake up suddenly and dramatically in the second half, such as their scorching comeback Sunday for a 44-point swing to beat the Grizzlies. But more often this season, a slow opening quarter has left the team listless through the remainder of the game.
For coach Billy Donovan, this pattern highlights the key issue this season — how to keep his team from playing predictably on offense.
“Trying to generate more assists, get more guys in double figures — I think we’ve done that,” Donovan said. “The guys have done a really good job improving as the year has gone on offensively.
“When we’ve been at our best, the ball movement has been really good. When we haven’t been our best, the ball has stuck and there has not been that quick, decisive decision-making. That’s kind of been up and down for us.”
The Bulls haven’t been particularly efficient in their ball movement, entering Wednesday’s game 20th in the league in assists (24.5 per game) and 23rd in assist ratio (57.4%). Although those numbers have improved marginally as part of a teamwide offensive improvement since the All-Star break — up to 25.5 assists per game for a 58.6% assist rate — this over-reliance on individual scoring often results in the stagnancy that can smother the Bulls at the start of poor shooting nights.
And the overall lack of ball movement also makes the game harder for the entire roster as players are forced to settle for tougher shots with a defender in close proximity.
“We’ve shot the ball fairly well this year, but we just haven’t generated enough easy baskets — whether it’s getting out in transition, free throws, offensive rebounds,” Donovan said. “We’ve been really a team that’s been predicated on having good shots.”
The Bulls are often able to survive this trend in part because of DeRozan and LaVine, who both thrive in isolation. But the two stars’ ability to attract defenders also requires teammates to be prepared to play off them when they pass out of one-on-one situations.
Donovan said when either player skips the ball to a teammate, the pass often is followed by a moment of hesitation that slows the entire offense.
“You’ve got to be spaced correctly so that when the ball does come out, the next guy’s ready to make the next play,” Donovan said. “It’s not that everybody’s got to be in a rush. But the next guy has got to be able to make the next decision.”
