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Their time is now: the Bulls have gone from sad-sack losers to sizzling contenders in a season that has been dominated by young, rising stars

Sporting News, The, Feb 11, 2005 by Sean Deveney

As he pulls up to the United Center on a cold January night, the gruff Chicago cab driver chuckles. "Look at that," he says, pointing a gloved finger at a half-dozen kids sporting jerseys of Kirk Hinrich, Tyson Chandler and Eddy Curry. "People wearing Bulls Shirts. Last few years, all you usually see is jerseys for the other team."

Seems things are changing around this bunch of Bulls, presumed to be Eastern Conference roadkill entering this season. By mid-December, when Chicago was 4-15, predictions of the team's early demise seemed on target. Talk of trades and the job security of vice president of basketball operations John Paxson spiked. The Bulls could not score, they were having trouble defending and this season seemed ready to be filed away with the team's dreadful recent legacy--119-341 over the past six seasons.

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But things have changed. "We lost to Dallas, and we probably should have won," says guard Chris Duhon, recalling a December 13 game. "After that, everything kind of clicked. The offense, the defense. It was just a confidence thing. We knew we could beat people. We won five in a row, and after that we started to come into games knowing we should win."

After that 4-15 start came--hang onto your hat--a stretch in which the Bulls went 18-5, winning twice in Detroit, beating the Knicks in back-to-back thrillers and piling up a 6-0 mark against the West. They've become a tough, intense defensive team, leading the league in opponents' field-goal shooting (41.2 percent). Sure, they've had a soft schedule that has been heavy on home games, but after a win over the Nuggets last week, center Eddy Curry said, "As long as we go out and take care of games like this and beat the teams we're supposed to beat, we'll be OK."

Until six weeks ago, the Bulls weren't supposed to beat anybody. In fact, the notion that the Bulls should be knocking off even visiting teams is one that had been reserved for the 1990s, those heady days in which Michael Jordan became an international icon, the Bulls won six championships and Chicago was the center of the basketball universe. In the interim, Bulls fans have wanted to be Bulls fans again. But there has not been much to cheer about--until now, at least.

"It's a lot different," Curry says. "It's a pride thing now, when you go out and people recognize you and say how good the Bulls are doing now."

"When I would go out, everywhere I went, it would be, 'Norm, what's wrong with those Bulls?' " says former Bulls great Norm Van Lier. "And I didn't know. So I'd say, 'Maybe if they do this, or maybe if they do that.'

"But no, it's all about pride and defense and effort, and this team is doing that. That hasn't been the case in the last six years. But the way this team plays, as a player, as just a citizen of Chicago, it makes you proud of them."

For the past three years, monumental improvement from the Bulls seemed to rest on the shoulders of Curry and his frontcourt mate, Tyson Chandler. Former Bulls general manager Jerry Krause gave away Elton Brand for Chandler, thinking that Chandler and Curry would be a dominant pair of big men. But credit Paxson for recognizing that Curry and Chandler were, at best, very productive role players. What the Bulls needed, Paxson realized, was better lead players who could allow Curry and Chandler to find their roles further down the totem pole.

Last June, Paxson put together one of the most productive rookie classes in recent memory, a group that inspires thoughts of how exciting the future can be while also inducing daydreams of great players past. Paxson landed three players who were in last year's NCAA Final Four--guard Ben Gordon, swingman Luol Deng and Duhon, a four-year starter at Duke. Paxson also signed Argentine forward Andres Nocioni, a gold medalist at the 2002 World Championship, over the summer.

All four are key players. Duhon starts and acts as a ball distributor and defender (think Nate McMillan). Deng starts, too, and his long arms make him a tough defender, but he has been surprisingly effective on offense (think Hal Greer). Gordon has been the Bulls' clutch man off the bench, a 42.7 percent 3-point shooter who already is known for his fourth quarter heroics (think Vinnie "The Microwave" Johnson). And Nocioni is a big, versatile agitator capable of hitting clutch shots and getting under opponents' skin (think Rick Mahorn). With that rookie class, plus Hinrich, a hard-nosed second-year guard, Paxson has succeeded in piecing together a team that plays the kind of tough defense coach Scott Skiles demands. At the same time, the Bulls' reliance on Curry and Chandler has dwindled.

Now Chicago has one of the best young teams in the league, a bunch of 20-somethings who win with depth, effort and defense, a group that is erasing six years of Bulls jokes and evoking the franchise's legacy of success. The young Bulls are guided by veterans Antonio Davis, Eric Piatkowski and Othella Harrington, but this, essentially, is an entirely new team.

Their time is now: the Bulls have gone from sad-sack losers to sizzling contenders in a season that has been dominated by young, rising stars

Sporting News, The, Feb 11, 2005 by Sean Deveney

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