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 Forward Danilo Gallinari scored 33 points, including a go-ahead
jumper in the final minute, and the Nuggets rallied from 18 down to
beat the Bulls 115-110 Friday night.
Denver guard Emmanuel Mudiay scored 22, and forward Kenneth Faried
had a key put-back among his 11 points and 11 rebounds.
"The most positive thing about this team and the best thing about
this team is we never give up," said Gallinari, who was 18-for-18
from the foul line. "We've been down in a lot of games, especially
in the first half, but we always battle back."
Guard Derrick Rose had 30 points, nine rebounds and eight assists,
but the Bulls couldn't overcome the loss of swingman Jimmy Butler to
a left knee sprain.
The Bulls were already playing without forward Pau Gasol (sore left
hand) when Butler went down with 1:05 left in the second quarter.
Butler landed awkwardly after he was fouled by Nuggets center
Joffrey Lauvergne on a drive to the basket. Butler lay on the floor
while being attended to by the Nuggets' team doctor.
Butler initially refused to be put in the wheelchair that was
brought out for him, as he wanted to shoot his free throws. He made
one of two, and then teammate Aaron Brooks helped him get into the
wheelchair. Butler had his knee bandaged after having it X-rayed.
"He said he heard something pop," Rose said. "With my knees, I knew
that was something serious. I came back here a couple of times to
use the restroom and (saw) that they were icing it."
Butler is scheduled to have an MRI exam in Minnesota on Saturday
morning before the Bulls face the Timberwolves, coach Fred Hoiberg
said.
"I talked to our trainers, the knee seems intact, the ligaments seem
stable," Hoiberg said. "He's sore. We've got to be prepared to play
without Jimmy for a time, but we don't want to jump to conclusions.
We'll know a lot more (Saturday)."
Butler, who was a game-time decision because of left knee
tendinitis, had 19 points, five assists in two rebounds before
leaving the game.
Butler's injury wasn't the only thing that went wrong. For most of
the fourth quarter, the arena scoreboard showed the Bulls having two
more points than the official monitors. The officials talked with
both coaches, and it was determined the scoreboard had the correct
total for Chicago.
"It looks like we were up nine and then we were up five," Hoiberg
said. "I didn't know what was going on with that. It was a weird
deal."
Referee crew chief Scott Foster told a pool reporter, "There was an
agreement that the score was wrong between both teams which alerted
me to go and try to figure what was going on.
"Everyone agreed that the score at the end of the third was correct
89-73 Chicago. I had the score book and the play-by-play cross
reference the statistical information and in doing so we found that
the score for Denver was minus-2. They had eight in the book but
they had 10 in the play-by-play. ...
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"They fixed it and we moved on. The confusion came when Chicago lost
two points, but the incident was solved by cross-referencing the
book and the play-by-play."
Without Butler and Gasol, the Bulls built an 87-69 lead late in the
third quarter before Denver came back.
Forward Will Barton had seven quick points and forward Nikola Jokic
hit two 3-pointers to get Denver within 100-95 with 5:58 left.
"Nikola's two threes, I feel like they were the two biggest shots in
the game because it gave us momentum," Mudiay said. "We were down 10
and he hit those two."
Barton finished with 18 points, and Jokic had 14 points and 12
rebounds.
The lead was one after Mudiay's 3-pointer, and Faried tied it at 105
with a free throw with 2:56 left.
Gallinari's baseline jumper with 51.2 seconds left bounced off the
front of the rim and through to give Denver a 109-108 lead, its
first since the second quarter.
"It was a lucky roll, but sometimes you've got to be lucky, too,"
Gallinari said.
Rose missed a jumper at the other end. Mudiay was then fouled, and
he hit the first of two free throws. Faried slid into the lane to
tip in Mudiay's miss and make it 112-108.
Forward Taj Gibson scored 18 for Chicago, and forward Doug McDermott
had 15 off the bench.
NOTES: Bulls F Pau Gasol might also miss the Saturday game at
Minnesota with the hand injury that kept him out Friday. Gasol has
missed only three games this season, and coach Fred Hoiberg said he
is a quick healer. "He's actually made quite a bit of progress,"
Hoiberg said. ... Nuggets F Darrell Arthur hopes to play Sunday at
New York after sitting Friday with a left quad injury. He has been
bothered by the injury at different points of the season. ...
Chicago F Mike Dunleavy (back) did not play but is expected to make
his season debut Saturday against the Timberwolves. ... Nuggets G
Jameer Nelson (sore left wrist) missed his third consecutive game.
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