Best game yet....by far! More about the game in a second.
Deb was in Connecticut this weekend for her grandmother's memorial. She passed away last month; this weekend would have been her 100th birthday.As a single father for the weekend, I decided to take the kids to Chicago for a Bulls game. You've got to love StubHub. I was able to get 3 tickets and a parking pass next to the arena for Game 4 of the Eastern Conference playoffs against the Nets for a reasonable price. It was a simple 2-hour trip door to door and the early afternoon start was perfect for taking the kids.
This was the first playoff game I've attended on my tour and only the third (I think) playoff game of any kind (1998 Steelers 7-6 victory vs Patriots & 2000 Redskins win over the Lions). As you can imagine, the crowd was very excited; hoping their Bulls could take a 3-1 lead in the series (even without Derrick Rose).
I warned the kids that it was going to be extremely loud, but they quickly adapted and joined in the excitement (see my Facebook pages for a lot more pictures). We spent a good portion of the second quarter walking around the arena checking out all the sites and areas for the kids to compare their hand-size, shoe-size, wingspan and height to professional players. They thought that was awesome. I've heard a lot of great things about this arena and it sure lived up to the hype. I now rank it as my #1 basketball venue - beating out Dallas. It is very state of the art with plenty of large flat screens to watch the game from the concourse; concession stands positioned to reduce crowding; cool bars, plenty of things for the kids and a great overall design. Although it is down-town, entrance and exit was extremely easy.
Now back to the game, because as I said, it was the best I've witnessed in person yet.The first half of the game was rather uneventful; although it was fast paced and high-scoring with the Bulls holding a 58-55 lead at half-time.
Brooklyn outscored the Bulls by 11 in the 3rd quarter and continued to hold a sizable lead well into the 4th quarter. Down 14 with about 3 minutes to go, the Bulls went on an incredible run. It was funny to see people come back to their seats who had given up on the Bulls just a few minutes earlier.
The comeback was led by the smallest man on the floor - Nate Robinson at only 5'9". ESPN is calling it one of the top 10 individual playoff performances ever. He scored a career and game high 34 points - 29 of them coming in the 4th quarter and overtime. He was absolutely unstoppable and amazing to watch has he just took over the game. The crowd was going crazy. It looked like he had won the game in the 1st overtime when he hit a shot with 2 seconds left to take a 2 point lead. However, the Nets hit a shot at the buzzer to tie it again (photo at the right is a bit blurry, but it shows Joe Johnson driving for the tying shot). 
The Bulls had a chance to win it at the end of the second overtime, but came up just short. By this time Ryan was getting a little upset that for an hour I kept telling him the game would be over in 2 minutes. We started our exit during the 3rd overtime when the Bulls started to put the game out of reach. 3 Overtimes; multiple time-outs and a few video reviews caused the game to last just shy of 4 hours. When it was all said and done, the Bulls won 142-134 to take a 3-1 lead in the series. There were 5 players that recorded double-doubles:- Joakim Noah - 15 points; 13 rebounds
- Kirk Hinrich - 18 points; 14 assists
- Deron Willimas - 32 points; 10 assists
- Brook Lopez - 26 points; 11 rebounds
- Reggie Evans - 15 points; 13 rebounds
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