Blogs.Bulls.com

The contents of this page have not been reviewed or endorsed by the Chicago Bulls. All opinions expressed by Sam Smith are solely his own and do not reflect the opinions of the Chicago Bulls or their Basketball Operations staff, parent company, partners, or sponsors.

Coach Vinny Del Negro said it doesn’t look like Tyrus Thomas will be ready to play Saturday when the Bulls host the Utah Jazz.

“It’s not great,” Del Negro said before Friday’s game against the Celtics. “He probably won’t play Saturday. It’s kind of a day to day thing. He still has a little headache and is tired and it’s something we’ll monitor and the doctors will see him and we’ll get a report (Saturday).”

Celtics coach Doc Rivers was a celebrated Chicago area guard from Proviso East High School, so he still likes to keep up on the Chicago prep scene. And he says he’s not at all surprised by the superb play of Derrick Rose since the day his brother called him when Rose was a sophomore beating Proviso East and telling Rivers he’d seen a guard who was like Doc, though only much better.

“My brother called me and said, ‘I just saw a better version of you,'” said Rovers pregame. I was like, ‘Who? What?’ He said, ‘This guy Rose took over the game. He’s going to be something special. It’s the first I heard his name. Obviously that piques your interest and you want to find out and go look and we did. He’s a terrific player. It’s rare for a rookie to be the leader of a team. Forget how he plays. They follow him. You see that with Magic, Isiah. I haven’t seen it with many point guards. He’s one of them. I think he just loves playing basketball. He’s one of those guys whose play migfht be showy. He’s not. He does his job. He’s not into one-on-one competitions with other guards. He wants to win. He’s going to be a winner. Let’s hope not too soon. But he’s going to be a winner.”

The Bulls got a scare in the first half against the Celtics, and not only falling behind by a dozen in the first quarter as the Celtics starters overwhelmed the Bulls to start the game. First Drew Gooden suffered a sprained ankle and would not return. But then Rose soon after with 2:54 left in the first came up limping after a drive left at Rajon Rondo. Rose went out briefly with what was described as a right knee contusion.

But he came back as the Bulls did to trail just 57-55 at halftime as Rose had 14 points in the first half, the Celtics dropping off and Rose hitting his jumper again.

“Just missing,” said Rose of struggles against Charlotte and the Clippers. “I got my confidence back. We weren’t shooting in practice. We were doing walk throughs and leaving without shooting and I think it hurt me a little bit.”

Rose was five of seven in the first half and the Bulls scored 34 points in the second quarter, though the Celtics went strictly with subs the first half of the quarter as the Bulls ended up the first half shooting 51.1 percent.