With all due respect to college basketball, no game had more madness Thursday than the Los Angeles Lakers’ game against the Chicago Bulls.
The Lakers lost to the 33-40 Bulls despite holding a 115-110 lead with 10 seconds to go. What followed was a preposterous sequence of events, culminating in a halfcourt buzzer-beater from Josh Giddey.
The Bulls started the comeback with a corner 3-pointer from Patrick Williams to cut the deficit to two points with 9.8 seconds left. In theory, the Lakers were supposed to inbound the ball and take the obvious foul from the Bulls. In practice, LeBron James soft-bounced the inbounds pass and had it stolen by Giddey, who found an open Coby White for a 3-pointer.
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116-115 Bulls, with six points scored in six seconds.
The Lakers nearly redeemed themselves on the next possession. Austin Reaves found a lane and took the ball to the rim to give the Lakers the lead back. At that point, the Bulls had no timeouts left and 3.3 seconds left.
Fortunately, no one picked up Giddey after he inbounded the ball, allowing him to reach halfcourt, sink the buzzer beater with James in his face and blow the roof off the United Center.
That might just be the worst loss any NBA team has taken all season, especially when you consider the Lakers led by as many as 18 points early in the fourth quarter.
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Giddey finished the game with a triple-double, posting 25 points, 14 rebounds and 11 assists, while White led the team with 26 points. Reaves had 30 points on the Lakers’ side.
Theoretically, the Lakers are healthy now, and also theoretically, they are a true contender when healthy. However, that hasn’t exactly been the case in the past week or so.
How did the Bulls win that game? How did the Lakers lose it? How did Josh Giddey make that shot? (Photo by Michael Reaves/Getty Images)
(Michael Reaves via Getty Images)
It started with another loss to the Bulls. James returned to the team Saturday after two weeks out with a groin injury, and the Lakers proceeded to get run out of the gym. The same thing happened against the Orlando Magic two days later.
Los Angeles got a reprieve when James saved them with a tip-in buzzer-beater against the Indiana Pacers on Wednesday, but the flipside of a win like that is the Lakers were a fingertip from losing five games in a row (they lost their last game without James too).
With their record at 44-29 and only nine games left in the regular season, this isn’t the portion of the calendar the Lakers want to still be figuring things out. For now, they still sit in fourth place in the Western Conference, though losses like Thursday’s probably feel like they count double.
