(670 The Score) In a departure from the norm of the past two months, the Bulls had the needed tenacity, defensive effort and focus to compete with an elite team Sunday evening.
What they didn't have, as has also been the case at times, was enough on the offensive end.
The Bulls lost 93-86 to the defending champion Bucks in a hard-fought Game 1 of their first-round series at Fiserv Forum. It was an evening in which the Bulls shot a season-worst 32.3% as star forward DeMar DeRozan (6-of-25) and star guard Zach LaVine (6-of-19) combined to shoot 12-of-44.
"I thought our guys really competed and battled," coach Billy Donovan said. "There's some things that we can clean up from what we were trying to do defensively and offensively that we can get better. But I think the competitive spirit that our guys played with and the togetherness that they played with was really good."
The Bulls acknowledged their loss was a missed opportunity. The Bucks shot just 10-of-38 on 3-pointers, and star wing Khris Middleton and guard Jrue Holiday struggled for much of the evening.
While admitting that, the Bulls also found hope in their competitiveness and how they fought after the Bucks swept them in the season series, which featured two blowouts recently. The Bulls got off to a terrible start, trailing 9-0 just 93 seconds into the game, and fell behind by as many as 16 points before steadying themselves in the second quarter and taking 69-64 lead with 2:52 left in the third quarter on the strength of a 13-0 run.
Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo (27 points, 16 reounds) willed his team back in control before the Bulls had a chance to tie it late, but LaVine missed a clean look at a deep 3-pointer from 31 feet with 29.7 seconds left.
"We showed each other we could do it, we could communicate, we could come together and withstand the punches thrown at us," DeRozan said. "We got down 9-0 at the beginning of the quarter. We didn't let that break us. We kept picking it up, picking it up. Now we understand and know how hard we got to play defensively. Offensively, I guarantee you we aren't going to shoot like we shot tonight."
DeRozan then doubled down with that personal guarantee for himself.
"It's nothing they're doing defensively," DeRozan said. "Most of the shots I took were wide open – wide open, wide open. I'll live with them again. Like I said, no way in hell will I shoot 6-of-25 again."
Donovan credited the Bucks' defense while also sharing areas of emphasis for the Bulls to fix offensively. He felt his team didn't take advantage of transition opportunities well enough and that it also attempted a few too many pull-up jumpers instead of getting to the paint and then spraying the ball out. Donovan also wants the Bulls to play through center Nikola Vucevic more after he had 24 points and 17 rebounds despite his own rough 9-of-27 shooting night.
"We know we're a good team," Vucevic said. "We just have to do the right things over and over again and stay with it. I thought tonight was a good response compared to what happened to finish the regular season.
"We just stuck with it. We just kept fighting. We did a lot of little things, and down the stretch, a couple shots go in, we maybe have a chance to win the game … We saw what we need to do to play with them and have a chance to win."
Game 2 will be Wednesday in Milwaukee.
"We did a good job fighting," LaVine said. "Obviously, with us shooting this way and defending the way we did, keeping the game low – they didn't even have 100 points – so I think we had a lot of missed opportunities."
Cody Westerlund is a sports editor for 670TheScore.com and covers the Bulls. Follow him on Twitter @CodyWesterlund.
