Chicago Bulls win against the Pacers and the Nets lost against the Jazz

(Basketball news) The Chicago Bulls won the Indiana Pacers 122-115 as Nikola Vucevic inspired them to a very good victory. For the Bulls, Vucevic came up big with a season-high 36 points and 17 rebounds, to which DeMar DeRozan added 31 points, Vucevic went 16 of 21 from the field, and had four assists and three blocks. For the Pacers, Caris LeVert had 42 points as he also had eight assists and five rebounds, the recently signed Terry Taylor finished with 21 points, 14 rebounds and five assists. With this result they moved up to top of the Eastern Conference table as they improved to 33-19.

''It's like people think he has this huge size advantage but I'm not really used to playing against smaller guys like that,'' said Vucevic, the 6-foot-11 veteran who only faced one defender taller than 6-7. ''There were a lot of seals in the post so a lot of my points were easy. It's just a different look and different for me.''

“I was really, really impressed with what he did at the rim tonight,'' Donovan said. ''He had a couple of really good blocks and he made some guys miss some shots as well.''

'It's a disappointing result but there's plenty of good things going on,'' coach Rick Carlisle said. ''We've just got to stay in the fight while we're undermanned.''

''He cut me from my last NBA team and offered me my first coaching job – in the same phone call,'' Carlisle said. ''Anytime someone sees you and believes you and gives you that first opportunity, that's very special.''

The Nets lost their seventh consecutive match, after being defeated by the Utah Jazz 125-102 as Donovan Mitchell made his return – and the Utah Jazz suddenly looked like the NBA's best offense again. For the Jazz, Mitchell scored 27 points after missing eight games because of a concussion, Bojan Bogdanovic added 19 points and 11 rebounds as Eric Paschall scored 16 points, Hassan Whiteside had 15 points and Mike Conley 14 for the Jazz, who have won twice after losing seven of eight injury-riddled games. For the Nets, Kyrie Irving, the only Nets star to play, scored 15 points on 20 shots as Brooklyn rookie Cam Thomas posted a career-high 30 points just four games after setting his previous best of 25 last week. With this result the Jazz improved their record to 32-21 as they stayed 4th in the Western Conference.

''There's so much focus other teams have on him that it frees up other guys offensively — he's Donovan Mitchell and makes life a lot easier for everybody,'' said Alex Jensen, who was Utah's acting coach with Quin Snyder in the COVID-19 health and safety protocols.

''He was unbelievable,'' Udoka Azubuike said. ''It looked like a video game. There was one time I had to catch myself in the moment because I was just watching him. Every shot was going in. Don is a star.''
''I was just happy to be playing basketball,'' Mitchell said. ''I was joking before the game that I didn't care if the ball went in. I was just happy to be out there running around, guarding, thinking the game and playing with my teammates.''

''We're going through a tough stretch,'' Brooklyn coach Steve Nash said. ''We're undermanned and we're asking guys to do more. We played against an excellent offensive team. … I just keep telling the guys that it's about staying together through this.''

Also read: Lakers snapped out of their losing streak and the Nets lose 6 in a row

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