3. The second unit wasn’t a problem on Thursday night
A gigantic problem in recent times for the Bulls is the play of their second unit.
Usually to start the second quarter, Bulls head coach Fred Hoiberg will send out Dwyane Wade with four guys off the bench.
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At full strength, it’d be Wade, Isaiah Canaan, Doug McDermott (who has missed time with two seperate concussions already this season), Nikola Mirotic and Bobby Portis.
That lineup has been completely awful so far this season. (Tyler Pleiss of SB Nation‘s Blog a Bull broke down the lineup’s struggles. It’s been bad.)
But on Thursday night, this unit was a plus for the Bulls in an ugly game.
The second quarter started with the Jazz leading, 26-25. By the time Hoiberg subbed in the resst of the starters with 7:33 left before halftime, the game was knotted at 36, which obviously means the second unit was a +1 in that stretch.
Compared to what they’ve been doing during games, that’s a huge nugget for the Bulls and one they needed in the midst of such a bad game (with a good result for the Bulls).
With this second unit back in to start the fourth quarter, it took less than 90 seconds for Jazz head coach Quin Snyder to call a full timeout because the Bulls had pushed a 66-58 lead out to 13 points to start the fourth quarter.