Pau Gasol had 18 points, 13 rebounds and three blocked shots, and the Chicago Bulls snapped San Antonio’s five-game winning streak with a 92-89 victory over the Spurs on Monday night in Chicago. But it didn’t matter because their own defense was the difference in another big win against a Western Conference opponent. Gasol is in a mini slump right now, making just 15-of-49 (30.6 percent) from the field in his last three games. Rookie small forward Stanley Johnson notched the first double-double of his career with 19 points and a season-high 10 rebounds, and small forward Marcus Morris chipped in 12 points and six assists for the Pistons. He should be fine.
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“The Bulls are always a good defensive team”, Parker said. The Spurs are the better of the two teams when it comes to assist-to-turnover ratio, ranking fourth in the National Basketball Association at 1.75.
Kings 112, Mavericks 98: DeMarcus Cousins scored 16 of his 31 points in the fourth quarter, and Sacramento beat struggling Dallas. That means Derrick Rose will be the only healthy point guard for the Bulls in this one and although he has picked up his play a little bit his numbers are still not all that pretty.
Leonard had 25 points and eight rebounds for San Antonio, which had won nine of 10. Defensively, the Spurs yield 89.7 points against the opposing teams.
This game marks the season’s first head-to-head clash between these two.
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The Celtics, winners of three of their past four games, improved to 10-8. “They just didn’t go in”. With one minute to play, Gasol came through with a huge rejection against Aldridge that kept the game tied. The Spurs are allowing 32 percent shooting from deep and are 13-0 when allowing less than 100 points. He is still finding his groove in San Antonio, but his best contributions have been on the defensive end this season, which is different than the Aldridge we have seen in the past. His last game under 20 was Nov 21 against the Memphis Grizzlies, and against the Atlanta Hawks he scored 22 points while attempting just 11 field goals. The Bulls though, have been very good at home so far as they have posted a 5-1 record at the United Center. The San Antonio Spurs rank 25th in offensive rebounding.
