The Milwaukee Bucks beat the Chicago Bulls 92-90 in game 4 of their playoff series to narrow it down to 3-1, with the hero of the day being Jerryd Bayless scoring a buzzer beater after breaking loose from Derrick Rose on the final play of the game.
The teams were tied at 90-90 following a foolish Rose turnover on the Bulls’ final possession, leading Jason Kidd to call a timeout, leaving the Bucks with 1.3 seconds to perform something useful off of the inbound play. The Bulls were busy guarding the perimeter, leaving Rose on his own with Bayless under the basket. Bayless juked Rose like a wide receiver would to a cornerback and got a clean look for the game winning layup.
Rose turned the ball over eight times in a very bad game for the Bulls’ point guard, scoring just 14 points on 5-of-13 from the field. Obviously no one was going to blame him afterwards for losing the game, and overall, the mistakes made throughout game 3 were just as costly, but the one getting burned on both ends in the finale was Rose and no one else.
Rose actually helped the Bulls get back in the game. First it was his 3-pointer to narrow the lead down to three points, followed by him cutting to the basket and hitting Pau Gasol on the trailer with an assist that led to a layup and a foul, with Gasol converting the and-1, tying the game at 90 each. The Bulls got their chance to win the game, but Rose trapped himself and lost the ball to Khris Middleton.
This was the first postseason win for the Bucks in five years, getting most of their firepower from the bench. O.J. Mayo scored 18 points to lead the way, helped by Jared Dudley with 13 points and Bayless with 10. The Bucks shot just 39.1% from the field, but made the most of 12 offensive rebounds and outscored the Bulls’ bench 47-13, getting points just from Taj Gibson and Nikola Mirotic.
Jimmy Butler led the Bulls with 33 points (Averaging 28.3 in the postseason) and Gasol followed scoring 16. But Joakim Noah remains an issue, scoring just four points on 2-of-5 from the field. He becomes less and less involved in the offensive game, and the Bulls can’t afford to have a player that the defense doesn’t even think about, not when it’s a strong defense like the Bucks that should be kept on its toes and busy.
The Bulls turned the ball over 21 times. Sure, it had something to do with the long arms of players and especially Mayo (four steals) and Zaza Pachulia (six steals), but the Bulls were incredibly clumsy in their passing, throwing passes into traffic time after time, as if failing to realize that what they’re doing is wrong. It won’t look like this in game 5 back in Chicago, but this series is still not over, and has the potential to get very interesting.