The Pistons need to come to town more often

If the Detroit Pistons played the Bulls a lot more, the Bulls would be a nice contender right now. For some odd reason, the Bulls actually show up to play against the Pistons. Or, they don't. Last night the Bulls played well.

Luol Deng was out with that sore achilles tendon problem and Andres Nocioni started in his place putting up 21 points. Thabo Sefalosha started and put up nice numbers. He had 12 points and 13 boards all while having the 2nd most minutes in the game with 35:39. By sticking with Thabo, Jim Boylan kept in a young guy who has been playing well in his new role. 

The Pistons just did seem to be able to find a groove. They had more turnovers, shot poorly from the free throw line and shot poorly from 3-point range. But the nice thing was the Bulls actually capitalized on that. They scored off of turnovers. They controlled the pace of the game as well. And they rebounded. It was like everything that everyone has stated they needed to do, they did and did pretty well.

It was a necessary win for the Bulls who had a good chance at beating Golden State the night before but blew it. And don't think that was in the back of everyones mind as the 4th quarter rolled around. But they held on and played well. Now if only they could build on this for a string of wins, we might be able to sneak in the backdoor of the playoffs. But until they string together multiple good games in a row, I am not going to mention that again.

One thing that seems interesting to me is that Jim Boylan is still trying to find an indentit\y for his team and his lineup choices. Some games we don't hear from some younger guys and sometimes they are in the game a lot. It seems like he is still trying to find who is going to step up. While that is something that is needed, I still think that Aaron Gray, Tyrus Thomas and Thabo Sefalosha need to get some more consistent time. Joakim Noah has seemed to find some consistency to his role and now its time for the others. I am not saying they eed to dominate playing time, but more consistency to the types of minutes and roles might actually help the develop into higher caliber players.

A win is a win though. And its especially nice against Detroit. Even though the Bulls needed this game more than Detroit did, it was still a good victory that was played well. And Chris Duhon is out with some sore of knee injury. It just means more time for Thabo and that is not a bad thing as of right now.