The Chicago Bulls fell to a 124-104 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder at home to open their season. The game saw many issues for the Bulls bubble to the surface, leading to a players-only meeting after the first game of the season, according to ESPN.
Zach LaVine commented on the situation, sharing that the team is frustrated, but this experience will make them stronger.
“Guys want to win. You put up a game like this in game one, you’re going to have some conversations. Guys are frustrated and you should be. … It’s a good thing, but sucks that it happened in game one. It happened. We got to go from there.”
LaVine had an especially bad game, playing for just 24 minutes and racking up 16 points on 25.0% shooting. It was a flat and lifeless performance by the Bulls, who were no match for the Thunder’s fast-paced style of play that let them open their season with a big win.
Head Coach Billy Donovan Reacts To The Situation
A players-only meeting halfway through the season usually reflects poorly on the head coach who is marshaling the ship. A meeting like this to open the season is very rough for the franchise and head coach Billy Donovan. However, this hasn’t fazed Donovan, who says this showed that his players care and are looking to change.
“I’m not going to sit there and say that it was bad like people were tearing up the locker room,” Donovan said. “It was nothing like that. They were in there talking. I walked in and they said, ‘Hey, Coach, can we talk?’ I said sure and I left… There’s nothing personal about any of this stuff. These guys do care, and they want to be better, but they know there are habits they’ve got to change, and they’ve got to break. And they’re talking about trying to do that collectively as a group.”
Donovan was brought in at the start of the 2021/22 season to be the win-now coach that leads the Bulls into becoming a contender. Even though he had a bright start, he and the franchise haven’t recovered from all the injuries that ruined the first season. A stagnant roster since means Donovan has been unimpressive and could see his job on the line this year.
The Chicago Bulls Are Stuck In The Middle
The Bulls need to pick a direction soon. They can either go win-now and make some risky trades to add pieces. Given how badly their last win-now trade worked out, acquiring Nikola Vucevic but giving the Magic the picks they used to draft Franz Wagner and Jett Howard, along with Wendell Carter Jr., the Bulls will not be willing to push their chips to win with an average roster again.
Their other option is to rebuild by trading away their veteran stars like LaVine, DeMar DeRozan, and Vucevic. The Bulls have been a below-average franchise since the end of the Derrick Rose era, so starting yet another rebuild will be hard for the franchise and the fanbase to stomach. But it might be the best route forward with the current core that they have.
The Bulls will be monitored closely by most of the league heading into the trade deadline, as they may be the team closest to blowing up if the season doesn’t start well for them.
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