Bulls Keep Raptors From First Place
Posted December 8, 2006 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The Toronto Raptors had a chance to take over first place in the Atlantic Division Friday night, but second place will have to do for now.
A difficult road win over the Chicago Bulls would have put them just a fraction of a game ahead of the New Jersey Nets, but instead the Bulls used a fourth quarter rally to push past Toronto 93-90.
The opportunity was definitely there for the Raps on this night, but on a night when all-star Chris Bosh struggled, Toronto missed the presence of rookie Andrea Bargnani, who has improved tremendously on offense as of late.
Instead of Bosh, it was Jorge Garbajosa that led Toronto in scoring with 17 points. Bosh had 13 points to go with 12 rebounds.
Perhaps the worst part about Friday’s loss is that the Raptors had a legitimate opportunity to come out on the other end. Despite the fact that the Bulls played absolutely suffocating defence for the fourth quarter and forced Toronto into several bad shots late in the clock, the Raps had the ball, down three with 10 seconds remaining.
But the Bulls defence wasn’t about to go soft at that stage of the game, and although both Morris Peterson and T.J. Ford were able to launch three-point shots with time ticking away, both were highly contested and ultimately, missed quite badly.
A big part of that was Ben Wallace, who was his usually dominant self on the glass for the Bulls, grabbing 11 boards. Luol Deng did most of the scoring for Chicago dropping 25, while Andres Nocioni added 17 of his own to go with a game-high 14 rebounds.
The Raptors next action comes Sunday, when they return home to the Air Canada Centre to host the Portland Trail Blazers.
