Chicago ? Bulls coach Scott Skiles thinks the positive buzz about his team is a little premature.
Othella Harrington scored a season-high 20 points and Kirk Hinrich had 14 points and nine assists to lead the Chicago Bulls over the slumping Golden State Warriors, 94-85 Monday night.
Tyson Chandler scored 13 points and had eight rebounds for the Bulls, who have won four straight. They improved to 5-1 in January and have won 10 of 13.
“I don’t want to seem like I’m down when we win a game, but there’s been an awful lot of talk recently about how great we are doing, Skiles said. “We have young guys that are really impressionable. I’m answering questions about should people be on the All-Star team.
“We are getting a little ahead of ourselves. We are still a very young team that has a long way to go.”
The Warriors have lost six straight since Jason Richardson sprained his left ankle in practice on Dec. 31.
Mike Dunleavy put the Warriors up 50-49 on two free throws, then Hinrich and the Bulls broke the game open with a 25-8 run. Hinrich scored nine points during the span, seven straight in one spurt. He scored on a drive, hit a 3-pointer and then scored again in the lane on a runner to put Chicago up 65-54. Chandler made two free throws, giving Chicago a 74-58 lead with 5:30 left in the third quarter.
Chandler doesn’t think the Bulls have reached their potential yet.
“Tonight was a bad game for us in spurts. In spurts we played well, but definitely we can improve and put together a full game,” Chandler said.
Late in the third quarter, Adrian Griffin made a nice pass to Eric Piatkowski who finished with a layup and extended Chicago’s lead to 84-63, their largest of the game.
“We go in (to the third quarter) in pretty good shape. And we come out of the third quarter in not very good shape,” Golden State Warriors head coach Mike Montgomery said.
The Bulls scored a season-high 35 points in the third quarter and held the Warriors to 16.7 percent shooting. Curry added 12 points and Duhon scored 10 for the Bulls.
“We couldn’t score and they were scoring everytime down the court. It’s not a good combination,” Dunleavy said.
Speedy Claxton had a three-point play and Troy Murphy hit a 3 to get the Warriors to 89-83 with 1:47 left, but that’s the closest they got.
Claxton led the Warriors with 24 points and eight assists and Dunleavy had 19 points.
Antonio Davis missed the game with a sore right hip and Harrington started in his place. He scored 14 points in the first half on 6-of-8 shooting. Curry added 12 points for Chicago and led 49-48 at halftime. Claxton scored 12 points for Golden State in the first half and Clifford Robinson scored 10 points.
Robinson finished with 14 points.
