Bulls 96, Pacers 95 – Jimmy Butler scored 17 points for Chicago and played tough defense on Paul George on Indiana’s final possession, helping the Bulls hold on at home.
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The San Antonio Spurs made it five straight wins, overcoming the Portland Trail Blazers 93-80.
Boston put the game on ice by closing the third quarter with another 15-0 run, turning a 72-68 lead into an 87-68 runaway entering the fourth.
Andre Drummond had 17 points and 17 rebounds for the Pistons, who finished a six-game West Coast trip with their fourth consecutive loss.
“We’ve got to learn to build on our leads, but a win’s a win”, Butler said.
Hoiberg inserted Snell into the starting lineup in place of McDermott. He started the previous four games.
The Bulls are playing without Mike Dunleavy Jr., who is recovering from back surgery in late September. Adding Stuckey (sprained right ankle) to the injured list, and the Pacers lacked three rotational players. However, during this rare return to the court, Hill missed 3-of-4 attempts, which included a desperate 29-foot jumper late in the shot clock after he couldn’t throw a clean inbounds pass to George. Initially, the team said the No. 11 overall pick in the June draft would miss four weeks. “Just throbbing a little bit, nothing out of the norm”. “Six weeks is the earliest he’ll back. It could be longer”.
Isaiah Thomas scored 23 points and the Celtics used a 32-point third quarter to pull away and cruise to a 111-95 win over the slumping Rockets (see full recap).
Pacers: IN shot 40.2 percent (35 for 87) from the field, including a 9-for-21 performance from 3-point range…. Led by Mahinmi and Jordan Hill, IN had a 50-48 rebounding edge.
While Rose and Butler accounted for most of Chicago’s offense, the Bulls did get positive contributions from reserve bigs Taj Gibson (nine points, 11 rebounds, five assists, four blocks) and Joakim Noah (eight points, six rebounds, four assists and a steal), and even much-maligned Bulls stalwart Kirk Hinrich, who chipped in nine points on 2-for-6 shooting with two steals as the primary second-unit ballhandler as Aaron Brooks earned his first DNP-CD of the season. As a team, IN had a workable 13, but proved too much when Chicago had only eight themselves.
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Rose was noncommittal about his status for Wednesday’s game against the Phoenix Suns.
