Watching an NBA team attempt to tank is often compared to watching a slow-moving car crash.
But watching two NBA teams attempt to tank at the exact same time? That’s something different. Still a car crash, but the type that happens on an icy day, vehicles sliding sideways and screeching sluggishly through collisions as their brakes manage only to slow the damage.
That was certainly the outcome for the Chicago Bulls on Monday. The scoreline — a 142-110 beatdown of the Philadelphia 76ers — might seem like a welcome relief for a team on a six-game losing skid.
But this was the most important game of the season so far for the Bulls — and they squandered it by winning.
With two dozen games remaining in the regular season, the Bulls have only two goals: develop their youngest players and secure the best possible draft pick to begin a rebuild. That started with Monday’s game in Philadelphia, which presented a crucial opportunity to improve their draft position.
The Bulls and the 76ers are tangled up with the Brooklyn Nets as the three bubble teams for a postseason position in the Eastern Conference.
It’s hard to tell if all three teams are fighting for the 10th seed in the Eastern Conference or attempting to run away from the honor of a play-in tournament berth. All three teams would benefit more from a strong draft seed in May than a short-lived playoff run in April. The 76ers, in fact, can’t afford to climb any higher in the NBA standings without risking the loss of their 2025 draft pick.
If the 76ers had won Monday’s game, they would have claimed the head-to-head advantage with the Bulls on the season, a crucial step toward boxing Chicago out of the play-in tournament. Instead, the Bulls used Monday to cleanse a few frustrations from a grueling season — and keep themselves in play-in position for at least one more day.
The 32-point margin in the scoreline reflects a thoroughly lopsided game. And that’s because most of Monday was a literal bloody mess from the opening whistle.
Coby White had to be removed from the starting rotation because he couldn’t get a cut on his finger to stop bleeding. The game stopped again minutes into the first quarter when the officials spotted more blood, prompting a full search of every inch of the hardwood as the game crew mopped up the court. Lonzo Ball exited the game for good one quarter later with a head laceration, heading straight to the locker room as he held the left side of his forehead to slow the bleeding.
That’s only the start of the injury report for either team. Neither Philadelphia nor Chicago started their primary center. Joel Embiid was missing due to a nagging knee injury that might ultimately shut him down for the season. Nikola Vučević sat out the game with a calf injury.
With Jalen Smith still stuck in concussion protocol, the Bulls had only one center — Zach Collins — available on the bench. As a result, the Bulls embarked on the interesting thought exercise of redefining who exactly could reclassify as a backup center in a pinch, tossing rookie Matas Buzelis and forward Dalen Terry into the mix at the five. Ayo Dosunmu was also missing for the Bulls with a recurring shoulder injury.
In the battle of the benches, the 76ers never stood a chance. The Bulls used Philadelphia’s shorthanded roster as a punching bag.
Kevin Huerter sank seven 3-pointers after shooting just 30% from behind the arc this season. Terry snatched inbound passes away from 76ers players and threw down furious dunks. Buzelis spent only 12 minutes on the bench in the lengthiest performance of his short NBA career, finishing with 17 points, five assists and a block in his first win as a starter.
Against any other opponent — and on any other night — this might have been a welcome change of pace even for a team that wins more when they lose. But strengthening their advantage over the 76ers only worsened the play-in tournament position.
This issue was only compounded by the results of another game 135 miles down the road in Washington, D.C., where the Nets upheld their tanking duties by dropping a loss to a Wizards team that had only won nine games heading into Monday. The Bulls now have a full 1.5 game advantage over the Nets to hold onto 10th place in the Eastern Conference standings — despite being 12 games under .500 with a 23-35 record.
There are only two more games that truly matter for the Bulls in this regular season: the March 13 matchup against the Nets and the April 13 season finale against the 76ers. If the Bulls show a similar level of effort in either of those games, they will likely clinch a spot in the play-in tournament for the third consecutive season — and perhaps doom their rebuild efforts in the process.
