DeMar DeRozan can easily pick the lowest point of the 2023-24 season for the Chicago Bulls: sitting in the locker room in Boston on Nov. 28, nursing a strained quadriceps alongside the also-injured Zach LaVine, having watched the Celtics pile up a 32-point lead en route to a 124-97.victory.
It was a dismal night for the Bulls. Their fifth consecutive loss, the last four on the road, brought their record to 5-14. That morning, executive vice president of basketball operations Artūras Karnišovas had made a rare statement to the media expressing his frustration with the team’s bleak beginning to the season.
“I remember that vividly, just feeling at such a low point, feeling like such a letdown, all of us,” DeRozan said Wednesday. “That’s why you see the response the next game. We tried to build off that. It sucks to lose and get your butt kicked like that, and we’ve been fighting ever since.”
It was an unmistakable low — but that loss in Boston was also the turning point of the season.
The Bulls have gone 21-15 over the ensuing three months despite copious injuries, including the loss of LaVine to season-ending foot surgery. Their new vision for a movement-driven offense finally began to click. And Coby White has taken off as a star — and sometimes savior — on the rise.
This growth began with the first win after the loss in Boston. White and Nikola Vučević combined for 52 points to overthrow the Milwaukee Bucks at home in overtime without DeRozan or LaVine. At the time, it didn’t feel like much — a spurt of energy from a floundering team in a lost season — but since then the Bulls have improved enough to have playoff hopes.
“We just hit a really low point and we understood that we just can’t continue that way,” Vučević said. “Something had to change, something had to give for us to figure this thing out or it was going to get really ugly. We changed a little bit of the way we played, our approach. But I just think it was realizing that we can’t continue that way.”
In a potential measuring-stick game, the Celtics come to the United Center on Thursday night for the first game after the All-Star break. The challenge with Boston is always the same: the personnel matchup against one of the most stacked rosters in the league.
White offered a simple scouting report before Thursday’s game.
“The players they have are really good,” he said with a laugh. “They’ve got a (bleep)-ton of good players.”
The Celtics offense is a buzz saw that sets them apart as the top team in the Eastern Conference. They went 43-12 before the break and lead the second-place Cleveland Cavaliers by six games.
While All-Stars Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown continue to spearhead the team, additions such as Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porziņģis have bolstered the roster. For most of this season, the Celtics seemingly have faced one main question: Which team from the West will they play in the NBA Finals?
It’s a stiff test for the Bulls as they shoulder another round of injury absences. Forwards Patrick Williams and Torrey Craig are sidelined — Williams for at least another week as he recovers from a bone edema in his left foot, Craig for up to four weeks with a sprained right knee. Without any additions from the buyout market, the Bulls will be running a thin rotation that leans heavily on DeRozan, White and Vučević.
The Bulls are well aware of the challenge posed by playing short-handed against the best team in the East. But White believes his teammates are well past any wariness created by that loss in Boston three months ago. They’re just eager to start the final playoff push on a strong note.
“We don’t want to forget about what happened that night,” White said. “But for us, we’re moved past it. We’re gonna approach it like every other game.”
