Watching Derrick Rose rise up against Cleveland’s defenders is just amazing.
He’s got the leaping ability, the fighting heart as well as the drive to really try to help the Chicago Bulls pull off an improbable upset against the championship-seeking Lebron James and the Cavaliers.
Down 0-2 now as the Bulls head back to the United Center in Chicago, Rose needs all the help he could muster in their bid to make the series more interesting.
Titanic battle between Lebron James (top) and Derrick Rose.
Last season, Rose and the Bulls surprised everyone when they took the then reigning champion Boston Celtics to a tough seven game series in the opening round of the 2009 NBA Playoffs.
Back then, Rose had another scoring machine Ben Gordon to shoot the lights out either at the United Center or at the TD Banknorth, home of the Celtics.
Though ousted in the first round, the Bulls’ strong first round plays left a mark in the NBA history pages as one of the toughest, tightest Playoffs series ever played.
This year, Rose will have to do it without Gordon, who already joined the Detroit Pistons during the off season, as well as John Salmons, another lethal scorer, who was sent this midseason to the Milwaukee Bucks.
Center Joakim Noah has added some spice to the Bulls-Cavaliers series match up with his unkind words against Lebron and Cleveland, thus heightening the emotions further at the “Q” Arena in Ohio.
And so far, Lebron has responded with tremendous ferocity, as evidenced in his 40-point explosion in Game 2 where the Cavs scored a 112-102 win before the boisterous crowd at the Quicken and Loans Arena.
Though the Bulls have two big chances to even the series in Games 3 and 4 at the United Center, the odds are certainly stacked against them considering that the Cavs are already playing the kind of Playoffs intensity everyone expected from them.
And that in itself spells more trouble for Rose and the Bulls.
A sweep for the Cavs in the offing is not a far-fetched idea.
What do you think?