The Bulls have done their part. Actually, they did their part a long time ago.
Their regular season came to a disappointing end Saturday night with a 103-101 loss to the New York Knicks at United Center. It didn’t really matter, since they already had wrapped up the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference playoffs.
Their next order of business is to pay close attention to Sunday’s regular-season finale between the Washington Bullets and the Cleveland Cavaliers. Because whoever wins that game will be in Chicago on Friday night to take on the Bulls (69-13) in the playoffs’ opening round.
“It should be a very good battle and we’ll be tuned and attentive to it,” Bulls coach Phil Jackson said. “I think both teams have a lot of pluses and they have made successful runs at different times this season. Washington shows the most dramatic surge here at the end. Cleveland has come through with a couple of big victories.”
Both teams also have beaten the Bulls.
The Cavaliers did it Feb. 27 in Cleveland, holding the Bulls to a 33 percent shooting performance overall and 1 of 14 from the three-point arc. The problem with the Cavs is they control the tempo of the game.
The Bulls don’t like that.
“It would be ugly, half-court basketball,” Ron Harper said.
The Bullets don’t mind running, which they did all night in a 110-102 victory over the Bulls in Landover, Md., earlier this month.
There were two major problems for the Bulls in that loss, which occurred without Dennis Rodman and Toni Kukoc on the floor. The Bullets outscored the Bulls 58-42 in the paint, with 7-foot-7-inch Gheorghe Muresan collecting a season-high 24 points and grabbing 13 rebounds.
The other problem was point guard Rod Strickland and his penetration–he had 14 assists to go with 26 points.
For obvious reasons, Bulls center Luc Longley would rather face Cleveland in the first round.
“They don’t have a Gheorghe Muresan to defend,” he said. “It’s as simple as that.”
Without stating a preference, Michael Jordan said the Bulls’ first-round opponent will have their undivided attention.
“I don’t think it’s in our best interest to worry about playing Miami or New York,” he said. “We have to take it like we’ve been taking it all season–series by series, game by game. Whoever we play, we’ve got to beat them.”
That’s why Jordan and everybody else will be keeping tabs on what the Cavs and Bullets do Sunday.
“They are two teams that play hard,” Ohio-bred Harper said. “I expect it to be a very good basketball game. Hopefully, my home team can take care of them.”
