NBA Scores And More: Lakers Take Battle Of L.A., Pacers Edge Wounded Bulls, Warriors Handle Blazers

The Indiana Pacers overcame Derrick Rose’s 24 points and held on tight down the stretch against the reigning MVP to give the Chicago Bulls their first home loss 95-90 Wednesday night. Rose led all scorers but the Pacers forced Rose to pass on a critical possession late and Roy Hibbert converted a dunk for the last of his 20 points as the Pacers had won to avoid back to back losses for the first time all season.

In the last critical sequence of the game, David West missed a righty hook over Joakim Noah and the Bulls raced down the court down two with 37 seconds to go. Rose blitzed down the court but Darren Collison had gotten back and the Bulls set up the offense to try and tie the game.

Almost as immediately as the Bulls got set, Rose tore down the lane and went up. Anyone who has watched Rose for his short career would be certain he would take the shot, but Roy Hibbert and his considerable frame posed a difficult obstacle to score over and Rose found Brian Scalabrine in the corner wide open for a go-ahead three attempt.

But the lightly used forward’s shot was short and though Noah hustled for the rebound by diving towards the sideline, his attempt to save the ball was tossed down the court towards the Pacers end and the visitors had a gift transition run-out and a two on one with 20 seconds to play and the lead.

Collison wisely began to pull the ball out to spend some clock while Chicago would assumedly foul Indiana, but he tripped and the ball squirted free. Fortunately for Indiana, it rolled right to Danny Granger (team-high 22 points) who zipped a pass to Hibbert for the dunk that put them up four points with 13 seconds left.

The Bulls went for the quick two after a timeout, but Noah’s pass to Carlos Boozer was stolen by the Pacers, and the victory sealed.

The hectic sequence concluded a game that saw the Pacers start off strong in the first quarter by typically strong first quarter play by Hibbert and the home team Bulls rally to take a double-digit lead into halftime behind 14 second quarter points from Ronnie Brewer filling in for Luol Deng, who was missing the game due to a recent wrist injury.

The Pacers then answered after halftime by snapping off a couple of modest runs and strong play by Granger and Hibbert, overtaking the Bulls by the time the third quarter was complete. The fourth quarter added West’s contributions (seven fourth quarter points) to Granger and Hibbert, setting up the furious finish.

At Blog-A-Bull, your friendly BullsBlogger tries to get inside the head of Bulls head coach Tom Thibodeau to understand the personnel in that late game sequence:

Scal came in on a strange defensive substitution the possession prior, with Carlos Boozer playing with 5 fouls and him being all Boozer-y on defense and whatnot. Though it was a situation where having either Taj Gibson or Luol Deng healthy would've changed everything, inserting Omer Asik could've been workable with him taking Roy Hibbert and Noah switching to David West. Maybe Thibs reasoned that Scal was less likely to be called for a questionable foul, something that the Bulls bigs encountered for much of the second half. I can't as easily guess his reasoning soon afterwards to not have Kyle Korverin for the last-ditch effort down 4 points, outside of him, er, hitting only 6 of his last 24 three-point attempts. It likely wouldn't have mattered, but it was obvious how much the Pacers overplayed Rose and dared Noah (or anyone else) to do anything about it.

Tom Lewis at Indy Cornrows points out a difference in closing tough games this season than in seasons past:

But one thing was different. Newcomer David West wasn't around for the frustrating collapses in the playoffs last season, and he had no intention of letting his team fall into the same trap. West could be seen on the bench clapping his hands, pumping everyone up.

"Come on, we're alright, we're alright," West said.

The Pacers would end up being more than alright, after struggling to get field goal against the stingy Bulls for another two minutes after that timeout. The Pacers were still up two with the ball. West couldn't get his sweet-spot, 17-footer to go all night, so he took the ball strong in the lane to make a nice jump hook.

On Wednesday night, the Portland Trail Blazers outplayed a Memphis Grizzlies team that was still sore from a comeback win over the Golden State Warriors. On Thursday night, the tables turned a bit, as the Blazers suited up for their third game of a back-to-back-to-back against those same Warriors, who had a day's rest and the bitter taste of that Memphis loss still in their mouths.

And both teams looked their parts in Oakland. The Blazers started the game strong but faded over time, shanking their jumpers and rotating sluggishly to contest those of the Warriors. Golden State capitalized on those late rotations, sinking 52 percent of their shots and 11 of their 20 three-point attempts (as compared to 41 percent and 8-21 from the Blazers). Stephen Curry was the leader on that front, having by far his best game since returning from an ankle injury. His season-high 32 points came on a steady stream of effortless catch-and-shoot threes. Curry hit six of eight from downtown, and also deferred plenty to David Lee, who added 26 points of his own off lefty mid-range pops. Interestingly enough, Monta Ellis hardly scored, shooting just 2-9 for 4 points and instead opting to drive and dish 12 assists to feed the hot hands.

On the other end, LaMarcus Aldridge led the team with 18 points but shot just 7-17 due to remarkably solid defense from Lee and Ekpe Udoh off the bench. Aldridge was supported by another big rebounding game from Marcus Camby (16), and a pair of 16-point games off the bench from Nicolas Batum (who was efficient as hell, contract extension be damned) and Jamal Crawford (who was inefficient as hell, as is his wont).

Portland tightened up their defense and cut what had been a double-digit lead to as little as three in the fourth quarter. Lee, Ellis and Curry each connected on some big momentum-busting buckets, though, and the Blazers either turned over or rimmed out their chances to even the score. The final minute or two got a tad sloppy, with the two teams basically handing the ball back and forth with turnovers (Golden State even committed a five-second violation), but the Warriors hit the free throws necessary to keep Portland at arm's length as time expired, winning 101-93.

Check out Golden State of Mind for more on the Warriors and visit Blazer's Edge for your Portland coverage.

The Atlanta Hawks came into their road matchup with the San Antonio Spurs as winners of nine of their last 11 games, including a 6-1 stretch since starting center Al Horford went down with a torn left pectoral on January 11, but they simply couldn't keep up with the Spurs on Wednesday night. San Antonio used efficient performances from their role players to accomplish 51.2 percent shooting as a team while recording 29 assists on 42 made baskets. Without Horford to protect the paint, the Spurs worked their offense inside-out as DeJuan Blair scored 17 points on 8-12 shooting, Matt Bonner added 17 points with 5-7 from beyond the arc and Tiago Splitter dropped in 16 points on 5-6 from the field. While San Antonio used 52 points in the paint to maintain a flow of scoring throughout the game, Atlanta only managed 34 points in the paint and suffered through several scoring droughts laced with errant jumpers. The Spurs slowly pulled away in the second half and pocketed a very comfortable 105-83 win.

The game didn't really look like a blowout in the first half. Jeff Teague attacked the rim and penetrated with a purpose for the Hawks in the first half, collecting 13 of his team-high 20 points during that time, but nobody ever followed his lead. While Teague hit 9 of his 13 shots, the rest of the team only managed 38.8 percent from the field on the night. The Hawks' point guard helped to keep the Spurs within 4 points at the half, but as the contest advanced the disparity started to show. As Atlanta settled for more and more long jumpshots -- they only attempted 11 shots in the paint during the final two periods -- San Antonio surged ahead with a 33-13 run that made the final seven minutes of the game nothing more than a simple matter of course.

With Horford out, the Hawks have been leaning heavily on Joe Johnson for their scoring. Johnson had scored 20+ points in six of the team's last seven games (all six were wins), but simply couldn't find the range from the perimeter and scored just 10 points in the loss. Josh Smith also struggled from the field, hitting just 6-17 shots while also committing three turnovers. On a positive note, Kirk Hinrich returned to the lineup after missing the first 18 games while recovering from offseason surgery on his left shoulder, and made a good impression with 7 points on 3-4 shooting.

As for the Spurs, they shared the ball extremely well on the night. The 52.1 percent shooting may have boosted the assist total to 29, or vica versa, but what's the point in arguing causality when everything went so well. Tim Duncan only posted 6 points and 11 rebounds, and Tony Parker hit a quiet 15 points, but five other Spurs players hit better than half their attempts to provide a steady stream of scoring to fuel their second half run and seal the victory.

The Hawks fell to 13-6 with the loss and have not won on the road in San Antonio since Tim Duncan entered the league in 1997. Their five-game road trip rolls on as they try to rebound against the Detroit Pistons on Friday night. Meanwhile, the Spurs improved to a league-best 10-1 at home and 12-7 overall. San Antonio will be looking to secure a three-game winning streak when they open against the Minnesota Timberwolves on their three-game road trip.

For more on the Hawks go visit Peach Tree Hoops and for all things on the Spurs go check out Pounding The Rock.

If you don't think Lakers-Clippers is a rivalry, think again. It may not have a glorious and storied past, and it may not turn out to be anything in the future. But in the present, in the here and now, this is a rivalry, no matter what the players say.

The Lakers took round two in what is shaping up as a three-round heavyweight bout featuring everything but the punches -- and those don't seem far off. After trailing by 10 points early, and four in the fourth quarter, the Lakers used a 15-6 run to take control of the game late and hang on to win. The game had no lack of rivalry-level intensity, including six technical fouls, one flagrant foul, one ejection, a couple of minor altercations, plenty of smack talk and a post-game stare down between Pau Gasol and Chris Paul, who may not like each other.

The turning point came with a little less than five minutes left. The Clippers had trailed for all of 33 seconds of the game's first 41 minutes, but had just fallen behind on a Kobe Bryant jumper at the 5:01 mark. Always before when the Lakers had tied the game or taken the lead, the Clippers had responded with an immediate score. This time, Blake Griffin took the ball under the basket for a relatively simple reverse layup that rimmed out. Griffin grabbed the rebound and tried and missed again. Again he got the rebound, and this time decided to dribble out of the crowd to reset the offense. Metta World Peach reached in from behind and knocked the ball away into Derek Fisher's hands and Chauncey Billups immediately fouled Fisher. But Billups felt that MWP had fouled Griffin, and let the referee know about it, resulting in a technical foul. The Lakers made the three resulting free throws, giving them their largest lead of the game to that point at four, and they never trailed again.

The Lakers won this game by doing all the things they've been completely unable to do all season. Coming into the game they were dead last in three-point field goal percentage in the NBA -- they made 8 of 16 threes. They've gotten almost no production off of the bench all season -- rookie Andrew Goudelock scored 14 points and MWP was a major factor with 7 assists, 5 rebounds, 2 steals and a team-leading plus-20 in 38 minutes. They've been almost completely dependent on Kobe to score points -- they got a balanced attack with 24 from Bryant, 23 from Gasol and 19 from Andrew Bynum. This was a much different, and much more dangerous, Lakers team.

Griffin led the Clippers with a game-high 26 points and 9 rebounds. Caron Butler and Mo Williams contributed 16 each. The Clippers were bolstered by the return to the lineup of Chris Paul, who had missed five games with a strained hamstring. Paul showed no ill-effects of the injury in dishing out 12 assists in 27 minutes. However, his shot looked rusty after missing so many games, and he scored only 4 points after torching the Lakers for 33 in the first meeting between the teams.

So the L.A. series stands tied at one game apiece, with the third and final meeting still two months away. That game will happen on April 4, in the midst of the stretch run to the post-season, and presuming these teams are still battling over the top spot in the Pacific Division, that one figures to be even more intense than the first two.

As a rivalry games should be.

With the win, the Lakers improve to 11-8 on the season while the Clippers drop to 9-6. The teams are in a virtual tie for the lead in the Pacific Division, with the Clippers percentage points ahead.

For more on the Lakers, check out Silver Screen and Roll. To pledge allegiance to the Clippers, head to Clips Nation.