The Big Three slip as the Chicago Bulls complete a season sweep over the Miami Heat
The Big Three fell to number three in the Eastern Conference as the Chicago Bulls clipped the Miami Heat 87-86 on Sunday night, completing a sweep of their season series. Chicago wowed 19,763 basketball fans at American Airlines Arena with their sizzling
comeback from a 12-point halftime deficit.
Lebron “King” James and Dwyane Wade once again played the game for Miami but they missed shots in the final crucial eight seconds that would have won it for the Heat. The most interesting aspect of the contest was the fact that this was the fourth time since
24 February where Miami has held a double-digit lead by the end of first half and ultimately lost.
With this win, the Bulls moved a game ahead of Miami into the second position in the Eastern Conference and beat the Heat for the third straight time this season. The Bulls guard Derrick Rose scored a game-high 27 points, including the winning free throws
in the final minute of the contest.
Luol Deng stuffed the stat sheet with 18 points, three assists, and two rebounds for Chicago, who won eight of the last ten games of the season. Carlos Boozer played another productive game as he came off the bench with 12 points and 10 rebounds while Joakim
Noah added 11 for the Bulls, who have won the 17th game of the season on the road.
James played one of his best games of the season with a team-high 26 points, eight rebounds, six assists, and two steals, shooting 10-of-18 from the field. Chris Bosh added 23 points while Dwyane Wade had 20 points for the Heat, who lost the fourth consecutive
game of the season.
Match Analysis
The match was of great importance for Miami and Chicago as both teams were tied for the second spot in the East. However, the Bulls passed the test with flying-colors and grabbed sole possession of second place.
The Heat played the opening quarter offensively and got some nice shots from James. The Bulls, on the other hand, played sloppy basketball and missed some of the easy shots that came their way. Miami managed to take a 22-18 lead at the end of the first quarter.
Wade and James were unstoppable during the first half as they combined for 47 points. The 26-year-old James had hit a 3-pointer and free throws in the last minute of the second quarter, helping the Heat to take a 49-40 advantage into the locker room.
The Bulls fought hard during the third quarter to make the score a respectable one as they outscored the Heat 36-30 in the paint. However, Miami still carried out a 65-63 margin into the final period.
Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau said, "I thought we hung tough. A lot of things did not go our way in the first half, but we came back, got aggressive and we fought our way back into it. It was not pretty but we got the win."
The Bulls took the charge of the contest in the fourth quarter as Wade and James went cold after the intermission, contributing only ten points in the second half.
The Heat was down 82-76 with 3:30 left in the game. Mario Chalmers of Miami hit a fantastic 3-pointer to tie the game at 84-84 with a little over a minute to go in the final buzzer. Chalmers hit another shot to give the Heat a two-point advantage.
Trailing by two points, Deng got the ball to again tie the game at 86 with just a few seconds to go. He continued to play the game for the Bulls as he made one of two free throws to make it 87-86 with 15 seconds remaining.
From here onward, Wade and James got two fabulous chances to win the game for Miami but both of them missed the available shots in the last eight seconds of the contest.
Heat Coach Erik Spoelstra stated at the end of the close defeat, "There is nothing else we can do other than stay together and stay with this. We need to have a stubbornness to keep on getting into these situations and then have the resiliency to finally
break through. We did enough things to give ourselves a chance to win, but not enough."
Although Miami played well against every mediocre and poor team during this season but they are not up to the mark against better teams in the league. They are just 1-9 against the league's top five teams, the only victory coming against the Los Angeles
Lakers.
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