Horace Grant’s biggest rebound didn’t even show up in the box score.
With the clock winding down and the Bulls trailing Cleveland 99-96, Michael Jordan missed a jumper from the right side. Grant leaped between two Cavaliers and batted the ball. Then he battered Cavalier guard Terrell Brandon, who had the best angle on the loose ball.
Brandon hit the deck. Jordan took the deflection, made the shot and drew a foul on Brad Daugherty with 1:34 left. Jordan sank the two free throws to keep the Bulls close at 99-98.
“I figured Michael has a better shooting percentage than I do, so I just tried to deflect it to him,” Grant said. “I didn’t get a rebound?”
Grant, like the rest of the Bulls, had a much more incidental role in Jordan’s final field goal, the one with no time left that gave the Bulls a 103-101 victory and completed their four-game sweep of the Eastern Conference second-round playoff series.
The earlier sequence typified Grant’s play. On a night in which Scott Pippen struggled to score, Grant quietly chipped in 17 points, hitting 7 of 10 from the field and 3 of 4 from the free-throw line. He also pulled down a team-high 10 rebounds.
Grant did all of that despite reinjuring the ankle he sprained in the opener of the Atlanta series. He’ll undergo therapy Tuesday in Chicago.
Grant was one of several members of the supporting cast who helped keep the Bulls in position for Jordan to make another trademark Cav-killing strike. Bill Cartwright played 29 minutes, hitting 7 of 11 from the field for 14 points. B.J. Armstrong also made a key steal to help Jordan convert a three-point play with 1:16 left. And Stacey King and Scott Williams came off the bench to combine for 17 points and 6 rebounds in 33 minutes.
“We went out there and withstood the pressure of playing against a lot of their starters,” King said. “We responded well and kept it within four or five points and gave our starters a rest. They came in and finished it off for us.”
Added Williams: “We’re like the Navy Seals. We come in and do the job. We’ve been able to get to the boards a lot against this club, and that was a big plus.”
Early in the third quarter, it looked as if the substitutes would be asked to do even more. Grant came up limping after Craig Ehlo kicked him on the sore spot, and then Hot Rod Williams stepped on him.
Grant said it felt much worse than when he originally sprained it. He left the Bulls’ locker room with a heavy wrap on it, and he was limping heavily.
“He had a sprained ankle and he got kicked on the sprain,” Bulls trainer Chip Schaefer said. “That hurts.”
Grant will definitely benefit from the days off the Bulls earned by completing their second straight series sweep. If they’d lost Monday night, Grant would have had to go again on Wednesday night in the Stadium, and that would have been pushing it.
The Bulls’ reliance on Grant was underscored during a distressing stretch early in the third quarter. When Grant scored on a tip-in 80 seconds into the third quarter, the Bulls had sliced Cleveland’s lead to 56-52.
This was where the Bulls were going to blow past the moribund Cavs, just as they had done in Game 3 in Richfield Coliseum. But after Grant, clearly in excrutiating pain, limped off the floor, the Cavs immediately bolted to a 69-58 lead on a 13-6 run.
