After a three-game homestand in which the Chicago Bulls recorded wins over the Brooklyn Nets and the Dallas Mavericks, Billy Donovan’s team travel to Oakland for a Friday night matchup against the league-best Golden State Warriors. Behind superstar Stephen Curry, the Warriors have only lost one game this season sporting a record of 10-1.
Golden State head coach Steve Kerr, who lauded the Bulls as a “real contender”, has his team running one of the smoothest and most regimented offenses in the game. The Warriors players are constantly moving and setting screens both on and off the ball to get their teammates open which has led to them being one of the most potent scoring teams, averaging 115.9 points per game.
Curry is one of the players who is getting open looks in this system and is one of the deadliest shooters in NBA history. The 33-year-old recently set the record for the oldest player to ever score 50 points and record 10 assists in a game.
The Chicago Bulls start a west coast trip with a visit to the league-leading Golden State Warriors on ESPN.
What makes the Warriors great, though is that they rank at the top of the league in defensive rating at 99.2 as well as sitting in the top-five in most of the defensive team stats. One of the ways the Bulls can is on the fast break after forcing turnovers. Golden State ranks 23rd in turnovers, giving the ball away 15.8 times a game while allowing 17.7 points off of those turnovers per game.
Small Ball Game
Look for both teams to be running small ball sets with Bulls center Nikola Vucevic missing out on this matchup along with more down the road, while he complies with the NBA’s health and safety protocol after testing positive for COVID-19. Expect Tony Bradley to get an increase in minutes when the Bulls aren’t running three-guard sets with Alize Johnson manning the five. Rookie big-man Marko Simonovic also got the call up from the Windy City Bulls to add depth.
The Warriors will be without their 2020 number two overall pick James Wiseman while he recovers from a knee injury. Draymond Green is considered day-to-day and will most likely be a gametime decision on Wednesday night.
Supporting casts will play a key role
When playing the Philadelphia 76ers, the Bulls were beaten down the stretch, not by Joel Embiid, but by the Sixer role players. Furkan Korkmaz and Georges Niang were hitting everything and some key misses on the offensive end ultimately spelled the Bulls doom in those games. Golden State has a lot of players in their starting lineup and off the bench who aren’t exactly superstars but can hurt you from behind the three-point line which the Bulls have struggled to defend in this early season.
Nemanja Bjelica, former Bull Otto Porter Jr, Jonathan Kuminga, and Gary Payton II have been offensive juggernauts off the bench. Jordan Poole has been getting starting minutes at the two-guard while Klay Thompson is out with an injury and has been proving he can score at a high level.
Andrew Wiggins is starting to show the potential that landed him as the number one overall pick in 2014 putting up 35 points in the Warriors’ latest win over his former team the Minnesota Timberwolves.
Facing off against this Warriors team on the road will be the toughest test yet for this promising Bulls squad with more challenges to come on this West Coast trip.