Chicago dropped to 7-4 at home and to 13-7 on the season in Tuesday night’s 99-94 loss to the Timberwolves, who rewarded former Bulls head coach Tom Thibodeau a triumphant return in his first game back at the Windy City.
The Bulls got off to a fiery start, leading by as much as 20 points in the first period. But that’s when Minny started to heat up and picked up its defense, holding the Rajon Rondo-less hosts below 20 points in the next three quarters to eventually come away with the come-from-behind victory.
Rondo’s presence was missed, as the Bulls offense wasn’t as stable or as organized as it was with the former Boston star running the point. He sat out with a minor ankle injury, but the Bulls can expect him back in tonight’s game with Milwaukee—the first regular-season meeting between the two teams.
Jimmy Butler, who scored a game-high 27 points on 9-of-22 shooting versus Minnesota, has posted 26 or more points in all but one of his last seven games—a stretch in which Chicago’s gone just 3-4 SU and 2-5 ATS. Dwyane Wade, meanwhile, finished with just 12 points before getting ejected late in the fourth period. He’ll try to rebound against a Bucks team that’s yielding 103.6 points per game on average.
Giannis Antetokounmpo is literally doing everything for the Bucks this season, leading the team in scoring (22.3 PPG), rebounds (8.9 RPG), assists (5.9 APG), steals (2.0 SPG) and blocks (2.0 PPG). But Milwaukee might miss his services for this game with Chicago later, as Antetokounmpo is currently dealing with right ankle sprain.
Thus, the Bucks, who’ve lost four of their last five games (2-3 ATS), including the last three, will need Jabari Parker—their second leading scorer (19.4 PPG) — to step it up and take control of the offense. He’s put up 27 points in three of his previous four games. Parker is also averaging 15.2 points and 7.6 rebounds through five career games versus the Bulls.
Meanwhile, the Bucks could use every bit of help they can get from their other three starters in Matthew Dellavedova, Tony Snell and John Henson—all of whom are contributing at least seven points per game thus far this season.
There’s also Greg Monroe, the third top scorer for Milwaukee, who should see plenty more minutes and opportunities to wreak some havoc down low. He finished with 11 points on a perfect 5-of-5 shooting off the bench during Monday night’s loss to Toronto.
