CHICAGO - The Chicago Bulls came out firing Wednesday night and left the San Antonio Spurs with a mess to clean up.
In the first quarter alone, Chicago missed just three shots. The Bulls went 17-for-20 from the field, buried six of eight 3-pointers and piled up 41 points while shooting 85 percent in the opening period. By halftime, they were still rolling, up 70-56 on 66 percent shooting overall and 67 percent from deep.
Mitch Johnson didn’t try to pretend San Antonio had been sharp enough to slow any of it down.
“I’m not going to sit here and say that they (the Bulls) didn’t make plays or make shots,” the coach said postgame. “It just felt like there was very little resistance (from us).”
Victor Wembanyama was just as blunt about what the Spurs showed in that first half.
“They wanted (it) more than us,” the Frenchman said. “Couldn’t get a stop.
We let them get a rhythm. It was a whole new game in the second half really.
We just got back to normal.”
That reset turned into a full-blown comeback. San Antonio erased a 14-point halftime hole and walked out with a 124-119 win, its 10th straight, behind Wembanyama’s 32 points, nine rebounds and five blocks. The Spurs didn’t need Chicago to go cold forever, but they did need to stop feeding the Bulls easy looks and start playing with force of their own.
Wembanyama said that was the key.
“I think we react accordingly,” Wembanyama said. “We try to not overreact ... sometimes you’ve got to get back to what we do and trust the game plan.
Teams are always going to shoot below their average, or over it. Over time it will balance.”
He added: “It could happen - a team just plays out of their mind and is amazing one night and beats you. That could happen ... this is how you win, by respecting these things.”
Chicago still finished at 57.9 percent from the field and 51.7 percent from 3-point range. On most nights, those numbers are enough. Against San Antonio, they weren’t.
Dylan Harper said the Spurs’ first-half problem went beyond defense.
“We weren’t really into the game,” Harper said. “Everyone was quiet.
Everyone was trying to do their own things. We were all to ourselves.
I feel like the second half, it was do or die.”
Harper finished with 18 points, six rebounds and a team-high 10 assists, and the Spurs looked much more connected after the break. They had 13 assists in the first half, then added 19 more after halftime to finish with 32 on 49 made field goals.
“Just moving the ball, I feel like, was the biggest thing,” Harper said. “In the second half, it was more of, how can we get our teammates involved?
How can we just be the best versions of ourselves? When we’re passing the ball like that, we’re pretty unstoppable.”
The numbers from the second half tell the rest of the story. San Antonio outscored Chicago 68-49 after the break, controlled the paint 38-22 and piled up 14 second-chance points to the Bulls’ two. The Spurs also won the transition battle 16-2 in the second half.
Wembanyama scored 17 of his 32 points after halftime and finished 13-for-18 from the field. His plus-29 was the best mark in the game. De’Aaron Fox scored all 17 of his points before halftime and also finished with nine assists, one behind Harper.
Johnson said the Spurs showed what they’re capable of once they settled in.
“They responded,” Johnson explained. “They responded and played with the appropriate level of discipline, execution, physicality (and) competitiveness.
And that’s what they’re capable of. We just obviously need to do that more consistently.”
For Johnson, the issue wasn’t that the Bulls hit tough shots. It was that San Antonio let them get comfortable.
The Spurs still left United Center with the win, but the first half was a sharp reminder of the kind of consistency Johnson wants from this group. It took a 22-point deficit to wake them up.
Wembanyama kept his explanation simple when asked about the mood in the locker room after the first half.
“Focused,” Wembanyama said, describing the mood. “Not worried, but appropriately concerned. At some point, depending on where you are in the progression of a team (over) the course of a season, sometimes there’s a moment like today where you just got to do it.”
For a team hoping to build on last season’s run to the NBA Finals, that kind of moment matters. And after surviving one in Chicago, San Antonio can at least enjoy the ride home.
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Wembanyama Just Gave Spurs Fans Another Unreal Moment To Debate
Victor Wembanyama keeps finding new ways to make the ordinary look absurd, and his latest highlight came in the third quarter against the Bulls. The Spurs big man launched into a two-hand dunk from the free-throw line, the kind of play that instantly turns a regular night into another entry in the growing Wembanyama highlight reel.
It also came in the middle of a game where he was already stuffing the stat sheet, with San Antonio ahead in the fourth quarter and Wembanyama sitting on 32 points, eight rebounds, two steals and four blocks. Given the way he has been playing all season, with elite production on both ends and a shooting touch to match, the only real debate left is how many more moments like this he can still create before the league runs out of ways to react. [Read more 🡒]
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Fox is averaging 13.9 points per game this season, a steep drop from the level he showed when the Spurs acquired him. The bigger concern is not just the number itself, but the way it has come about: he looks less aggressive hunting his own shot, and that shift has put his offensive role under the microscope while also raising questions about how the league will view his trade value if this version of him sticks around. [Read more 🡒]
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Harris is the kind of addition that can change the shape of a lineup without forcing the Spurs to tear up what has gotten them off to such a strong start. The open question is where he fits once he is available, since his role could be determined by the coachs decisions and could land anywhere from the starting five to a more defined bench role. [Read more 🡒]