We aren’t even a month into the season but this four-game West Coast road trip for the Bulls is very crucial.
The Bulls are currently down four players with Tomas Satoransky, Chandler Hutchison, Lauri Markkanen, and Ryan Arcidiacono all in the league’s health and safety protocol.
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The Bulls start their West Coast trip against the Trail Blazers (Chicago has lost seven-straight against Portland); Coby White and Zach LaVine are going to have their hands full going against Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum. After a slow start to the season, White has been playing much better but he’s gotten in foul trouble in several games this season. It should be interesting to see how he fares against Lillard.
The next game for the Bulls is a back-to-back against the Kings. This is another game where Chicago’s backcourt is going to have to be ready, facing off against De’Aaron Fox and Buddy Hield. Fox is a really quick player and Hield is a really good shooter.
The Bulls then play the defending champs, a team that Chicago has struggled to beat for several years—the Lakers. Two matchups that I’m looking forward to watching are Wendell Carter Jr against Anthony Davis and Patrick Williams against LeBron James.
The last game of the four games is against the Clippers, which means another tough matchup for Williams, as he will probably guard Kawhi Leonard. Patrick has had a couple of really nice defensive games this season. Zach LaVine against Paul Goerge is an exciting matchup as well with two players that can easily score 50 points.
The Bulls have their best start through seven games since the 2016-2017 season. We know what we are going to get from LaVine, but the other players around him are going to have to step up, especially WCJ. This is no reason why he shouldn’t average a double-double in the next four games.
The reality is that these are four really tough games for the Bulls and if you look at the month of January, there is no easy game. This is going to be a test for this young Bulls team.
Let’s see how they handle it.
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