How Chicago fared against Boston during the regular season
This can kind of piggyback off my prior point for some people. Those people being Gar Forman and John Paxson primarily, but also Chicago fans that don’t see a distinction between a chance regular season meeting and somewhere between four and seven consecutive games against a superior squad that is going to scheme exactly your team and nothing else.
The regular season means a lot to people like Forman and anyone hanging their hat on those results, all 41 wins and 41 losses, will point to the Bulls 2-2 regular season record when facing the Celtics.
I re-watched the first meeting, which was the first game of the season for Chicago, hosting Boston, who was on the second night of a back-to-back. It was a fun game to revisit, hardly felt like the same team for a number of reasons.
The highlights of that game were the minor dustup between Jae Crowder and Butler early on, followed by a somewhat entertaining game and a late Wade 3-pointer that locked in a season-opening win against the Celtics.
Not coincidentally, that game was a home affair on a Thursday night that aired on TNT. If you don’t understand the significance of the Bulls playing at home on a Thursday on TNT, you’ve let yourself down.
The two teams played a week later, on a Wednesday in Boston and not on TNT. The Celtics definitely won that game. The two teams didn’t see each other again until the Thursday before the All-Star Game in Chicago. On TNT.
Chicago won. It took a shooting foul, correctly called by the way, on Marcus Smart to send Butler to the line to hit the game-tying and game-winning free throws with little more than a second left in the game.
The final meeting was in mid-March and it was the only time that these two teams met with their post-trade deadline rosters. Boston won by 20 points.