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Bulls lose Green for 2-4 weeks with groin injuryon January 4, 2022 at 1:41 am

8:40 PM ET


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CHICAGO — Bulls guard Javonte Green will miss two to four weeks with a strained groin, coach Billy Donovan said Monday before Chicago’s game against the Orlando Magic.

Green has carved out a role for himself as a solid contributor to Chicago’s success this season. He was inserted into the starting lineup after Patrick Williams‘ wrist injury and has started 18 of his 29 games this season, averaging 5.8 points and 4.2 rebounds per game while shooting 36.4% from 3.

When Green is on the court, the Bulls are 6 points per 100 possessions better compared to when he sits.

“Javonte has played really well for us and he’s been great,” Donovan said. “It is a tough loss. I think he’s complemented that first unit really, really well.

“He’s been such a big part of our team and has played so well, but we’ll have to figure out different ways to try and make up his energy. I think in a lot of ways when you’re playing as many games as you are, even the back-to-back against Indiana and Washington you need energy. He’s one of those guys that provide it.”

Derrick Jones Jr. replaced Green in the starting lineup Monday night. The Bulls were also without assistant coach Josh Longstaff, who entered health and safety protocols, and forward Tyler Cook, who will be out for a few weeks with a “pretty significant” ankle sprain, according to Donovan.

Their absences come at a time where the Bulls were just starting to get whole.

Both Donovan and guard Lonzo Ball returned from health and safety protocols for Monday’s game. Donovan said he had a cold for a few days but bounced back shortly after. He nearly returned in time to coach Saturday’s game against the Washington Wizards, but he couldn’t get a flight out in time for the game due to inclement weather in Chicago. Ball said he didn’t have any symptoms during his stint in quarantine so he was able to get back on the court last Friday.

Guard Alex Caruso (foot) missed Monday’s game but is “doing great,” according to Donovan, and has been participating in individual workouts recently. The Bulls wanted to give him a full practice day with contact before he played in a game, so if all goes to plan he could be on track for Friday’s game against the Wizards.

“I think if that [practice] goes well, he’ll be ready to play,” Donovan said. “We’ll just see how he responds to that, but the running, the workouts and the sprinting he’s been fine. He really hasn’t had any contact at all. We let the sprain rest and then he’s been ramping up, conditioning.”

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Hits keep coming, as Bulls lose Javonte Green for two-to-four weeks

Billy Donovan’s first day back on the job, and he was already the bearer of bad news.

The Bulls coach, who missed the last five games in the NBA’s health and safety protocol, was discussing the health of his roster, and it wasn’t until later in his Monday meeting with the media that he was asked about Javonte Green.

The high-energy forward had missed the game with the Wizards with a groin injury, but it seemed more about the team being cautious rather than the injury being serious.

So when Donovan dropped that Green would be out two-to-four weeks, it was a little bit of a surprise.

“Javonte’s played really well for us and he’s been great,” Donovan said. “It is a tough loss. I think he’s complemented that first unit really, really well.

“We’ll have to figure it out. I think that’s the one thing that’s been somewhat challenging is when these guys go in and out and you don’t have practice time, they’ve done a really good job of handling, ‘Hey, here’s going to be your role tonight,’ or ‘Here’s the position you’re in tonight.’ Again, it’s tough with him being out because he’s been such a big part of our team and has played so well, but we’ll have to figure out different ways to try and find ways to make up his energy because he’s been an energy player for us.”

Something his teammates have really appreciated.

Since becoming a starter early in the season, Green’s defense and his attempt to dunk on every opponent possible, has been embraced by the entire team.

And while he’s only averaging 5.8 points per game, that’s not what he’s being asked to do.

“I just want to do everything that DeMar [DeRozan] and Zach [LaVine] and Vooch [Nikola Vucevic] don’t necessarily have to do,” Green recently said of his approach. “Guard the best player. Do all the little things. Just bring them energy. Because they’re gonna score the ball regardless. I just want to take more pressure off them.

“I know how much my teammates and coaching staff appreciate what I do, and they tell me. Everything else is irrelevant.”

Alex Caruso [foot sprain] is expected back this week, so that will resupply some of the lost energy.

Honoring DeRozan

There’s no questioning that if the season were to end today, DeRozan would not only be in the mix for All-NBA First-Team honors, but the discussion for league MVP.

For now, however, he had to settle for Eastern Conference Player of the Week for the games played between Dec. 27 and Jan. 2.

All he did in those four games – all wins – was average 27.8 points, 7.3 assists and 5.3 rebounds, while becoming the first player in league history to hit buzzer beaters in games on back-to-back nights.

It was the second time this season he’s been player of the week, grabbing it back in early December.

Make-up time

The league announced the make-up dates for the three games the Bulls had postponed last month, and the new-look schedule because of it.

They will now host Detroit on Jan. 11, after the Dec. 14 game was postponed, the Jan. 26 game with Oklahoma City was moved to Jan. 24, the Dec. 22 game with Toronto that was postponed will now be Jan. 26, the Dec. 16 game that was postponed in Toronto will be on Feb. 3, and the Jan. 24 game in Atlanta will now be played on Mar. 3.

It’s a change that will actually benefit the Bulls, breaking up a five-game road trip at the end of January with the home game against Toronto.

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Monday’s high school basketball scores

Please send scores and corrections to [email protected].

Monday, January 3, 2022

LAKE SHORE ATHLETIC

Waldorf at Beacon, 5:00

LITTLE TEN

Earlville at Newark, 7:00

PUBLIC LEAGUE WHITE-WEST

Perspectives-MSA at Legal Prep, 5:00

PUBLIC LEAGUE BLUE-SOUTH

EPIC at Goode, 5:00

NON CONFERENCE

Agricultural Science at Lincoln-Way Central, 6:15

Austin at Steinmetz, 5:30

Bowen at Phoenix, 6:30

Christian Life at Hiawatha, 6:30

Kelly at Horizon-McKinley, 5:00

Schurz at Lake View, 7:00

Serena at Henry-Senachwine, 7:00

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NBA reschedules 11 recently postponed gameson January 3, 2022 at 11:24 pm

6:21 PM ET


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The NBA announced Monday that 11 games have been rescheduled in response to the wave of postponements that have taken place over the past several weeks due to the recent surge of COVID-19.

A total of 21 games were impacted: 11 that were previously postponed; another eight future games that were changed because of the postponed games being rescheduled; and two more — the San Antonio Spurs visiting the Brooklyn Nets on Sunday, and the Boston Celtics visiting the New Orleans Pelicans on Jan. 29 — that are only being played at a different time on the same day.

Nineteen different teams had at least one game impacted, with the Toronto Raptors leading the way among individual teams with six games being adjusted.

The Raptors were followed by the Nets and Chicago Bulls (5), Denver Nuggets, Atlanta Hawks and Pelicans (3) and Spurs, Philadelphia 76ers, Detroit Pistons and Miami Heat (2) as teams with more than one game being shifted as a result of the schedule changes.

The schedule adjustments will see many teams have to get through several games in a short amount of time — and in a wide variety of places — as the NBA tried to retrofit the schedule to make up for the games that have been postponed, all of which have been rescheduled from this Sunday through March 31.

The Nets, for example, are now playing at noon Sunday in Brooklyn against the San Antonio Spurs, before then flying across the country to play the Portland Trail Blazers Monday night. Brooklyn will then fly halfway across the country to Chicago to play the Bulls — in a previously scheduled game — next Wednesday.

“There’s no easy way to do this,” Nets coach Steve Nash said after Monday’s announcement, and before the Nets took on the Memphis Grizzlies at Barclays Center Monday night. “If we were expecting it to be a sweet little add to the schedule, and no blood drawn, that would be foolish.”

Toronto, on the other hand, is now hosting the Bulls on Feb. 3 — which had been the day that franchise legend Kyle Lowry was going to make his return to Scotiabank Arena for the first time since leaving the Raptors this offseason for the Heat.

Lowry’s return will instead come two days earlier, as Miami will play in Toronto on Feb. 1. The game that Toronto was originally scheduled to play that day — a game in Atlanta — will now be played on Jan. 31.

The NBA has spent the past several weeks dealing with the fallout of the Omicron variant of COVID-19, which has surged through the league and sent well over 100 players — and several head coaches — into the league’s health and safety protocols.

To combat the virus, the league has not only postponed the 11 games, but it’s also taken several steps to ease roster rules and increase flexibility for teams to add players on a short-term basis in order to have enough players available on a nightly basis to avoid any further postponements.

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NBA reschedules 11 recently postponed gameson January 3, 2022 at 11:24 pm Read More »