The Chicago Bulls played 27 games without Derrick Rose during the regular season, and they won two-thirds of them. They were without Richard Hamilton for more than half of the season. They lost Luol Deng for a long stretch.
So if there’s any team prepared to deal with the calamity that was the season-ending injury to Derrick Rose, it is them.
C.J. Watson will take over the starting point guard duties for the Bulls as they resume their first-round playoff series against the Philadelphia 76ers, and John Lucas III will be the backup. Is that enough to get the Bulls out of the Eastern Conference and into the NBA Finals, where they’d have homecourt advantage. Chris Sheridan of SheridanHoops.com discusses with CineSport’s Noah Coslov in the above video.
In the Boston-Atlanta series, the Celtics are certain to be without Rajon Rondo for Game 2 after he bumped a referee in the final minute of his team’s Game 1 loss. Can Keyon Dooling stick with Jeff Teague? Will Ray Allen be available after a sore ankle forced him to miss Game 1?
And finally, what about the Memphis Grizzlies? Can they rebound — especially mentally — from the epic collapse of Game 1 in which they blew a 24-point fourth-quarter lead? Or was this the type of series that was decided, for all intents and purposes in Game 1? (There’s one every year).