The Chicago Bulls are playing their best when it matters most—as the regular season comes to an end and teams jockey for postseason positioning.
Heading into a matchup with the Oklahoma City Thunder, Chicago is 7-3 in its last 10 games and 9-5 for the month, making the Bulls the ninth-best team in the NBA in March. They're fourth in scoring (120.9 points per game), third in rebounding (46.3 per game) and third in assist-to-turnover ratio (2.30).
Chicago is playing at the league's fastest pace but is top-12 in effective field goal percentage and true shooting percentage, meaning Billy Donovan's team is running and gunning efficiently. The Bulls are also the most clutch team in the NBA with a league-leading 13 fourth-quarter comebacks.
Josh Giddey and Coby White (and at times Matas Buzelis) are leading the charge for a team playing well enough to do damage in the postseason and potentially the playoffs.
But despite this fun late-season run, the Bulls still have the 2025 draft to focus on. As it turns out, they can do both.
How could Bulls' postseason run affect their draft lottery odds?
With a 33-41 record heading into play on March 31, Chicago has all but clinched a spot in the Eastern Conference Play-In Tournament. The Bulls are 5.5 games up on the Toronto Raptors for 10th in the standings with only eight games left in the regular season. Miami has an identical 33-41 record, but by beating the Heat twice this season, Chicago owns the tiebreaker between the two teams and would have the No. 9 seed if the season ended today.
That tiebreaker, which comes in so handy for the postseason, has the opposite effect in the draft lottery standings. The Heat are ninth in said standings, one spot ahead of Chicago. (If you're looking for the positive here, the Atlanta Hawks finished 10th in the lottery standings last year and ended up with the No. 1 pick.)
However, the Bulls still have time to vault a few percentage points closer to the top odds. The Portland Trail Blazers are 32-43, only 1.5 games worse. Even without Victor Wembanyama, the San Antonio Spurs are 31-43, only two games behind the Bulls.
Realistically, it would behoove Chicago to kick off a losing streak over this final regular-season stretch. The Bulls will almost certainly earn a spot in the postseason regardless, but could also end up with higher odds at landing the No. 1 pick and Duke phenom Cooper Flagg. Or at least a higher spot and a chance at another potential superstar.
With their current No. 10 spot, Chicago would have a 2.5 percent chance at landing the top pick this summer, per Tankathon. Flipping places with Portland and finishing ninth in the lottery standings would up that chance to 4.5, and moving ahead of the Spurs for eighth would make it 6.0 percent.
The Bulls should be hoping to do exactly what the Hawks accomplished last season: Make the Play-In Tournament, get their young players some seasoning in high-pressure(ish) games and luck into the No. 1 pick in the draft.
Just because Chicago has turned on the unforeseen jets and become a top-10 team in the league doesn't mean all its future dreams can't still come true.
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