Whatever Terry Cummings had, it must have been contagious.
The Milwaukee Bucks` All-Star forward came into the Stadium Tuesday night in the midst of a terrible shooting slump, and it seemed to infect the entire Bulls` team.
Cummings emerged from his personal misery by hitting 13 of 24 shots for 26 points in leading the Bucks to a 132-103 blowout before 10,312 fans, many of whom exited early.
The Bulls couldn`t shoot (42 percent from the floor), couldn`t play defense and left coach Stan Albeck running out of options.
”We`re going to go to back to work, and if we have to go to night school, we`re not going to have another 132-103 loss,” Albeck said. ”Our defense was like a sieve. They would score six and eight baskets on us, and you can`t let people do that, especially when you`re shorthanded.”
There was one bit of good news for the Bulls. Vice president of operations Jerry Krause said a doctor`s report indicated guard Quintin Dailey might be returning to Chicago soon.
”I`ll know more by the end of the week, but the doctor`s report was very encouraging,” Krause said. ”It was good enough that we will begin making plans for working Quintin back into the team. He will have a doctor from the hospital come to Chicago and stay with him for the first week after he is released.”
Dailey entered the drug rehabilitation program at Pasadena, Calif., Community Hospital Oct. 17 after requesting help with a ”chemical
dependency.” If he is on schedule, the six-week session would conclude on Thanksgiving Day.
Asked if Dailey would remain the full six weeks, Krause said: ”It could be even sooner than that.”
Even Michael Jordan and Dailey might not have been enough to save the Bulls in Tuesday`s game.
As they have done in the last two weeks, the Bulls stayed close for a half, even three quarters, and then fell apart during the 12 most important minutes. They trailed only 61-60 at halftime and 94-87 after the third quarter, during which reserve guard Rickey Pierce sparked the Bucks with 10 points. An 11-2 Milwaukee spurt at the outset of the fourth quarter signaled the beginning of the end.
The turnovers multiplied, and so did the defensive lapses in the Bulls` lifeless fourth quarter. Cummings riddled them with five baskets in one flurry of just over three minutes.
”It`s a bad feeling,” said Sidney Green, who finished with 19 points, second to Orlando Woolridge`s game-high 31. ”We`d better look at ourselves in the mirror and ask ourselves why we don`t play hard for 48 minutes. Losing by 29 at home in front of all these fans who are always tremendous to us . . . it`s bad.
”After this, it`s going to be a lot different. We don`t have any intensity, any emotion in the fourth quarter.”
Cummings, as usual, was Mr. Intensity. Even throughout his shooting slump, in which he only hit 39 percent of his shots, Cummings led the Bucks in rebounds and never stopped hustling. He came out Tuesday and hit his first six shots.
”When you`ve been missing seven shots in a row and then you hit those first six, I wanted to come out of the game and sit down while I was still ahead,” he said with a smile.
Cummings added 10 rebounds to his 26 points in a night Bucks` coach Don Nelson has been waiting for since the season began.
”It`s over, it`s history, let`s go on from here,” he said about Cummings` slump. ”We tried to run a couple of plays specifically for Terry early in the game to get him some easy baskets. But we did that for him before and it didn`t work.
”He did it himself. We held an extra practice yesterday, something we wouldn`t normally do. We had Terry play three-on-three. When I was a player, I did that a lot when I needed help.”
Maybe Albeck should have his team go through three-on-three drills from now until they face the 76ers in Philadelphia Wednesday night.
”We have got to shoot the ball better,” Albeck understated.
Cummings and Sidney Moncrief had 12 points apiece and Alton Lister added 10 in the first quarter, which ended with the Bucks on top 38-29.
They shot 63 percent from the floor in the period, while the Bulls hit only 39 percent. Green was pacing the Bulls with 9 points and 3 rebounds.
After the Bucks` Paul Mokeski hit the first basket of the second quarter, the Bulls went on a 15-6 tear to pull within 46-44 with 5:27 left in the half. Kyle Macy had 5 points in that stretch, including a 3-point basket, and Woolridge had 8 points.
