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Judgment call: Bulls have win taken away
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It's one of those games that fans are sure to be talking about in the morning and not for the right reasons.
Tied 89-89 in the closing seconds, Denver Nuggets (6-2) Chauncey Billups drove the lane on Kirk Hinrich and was fouled with six-tenths of a second left, it sent the United Center into an uproar of anger and boos.
"I wasn't trying to get to the line," Billups said. "I was just trying to be aggressive. I had a layup though. The play was, either I was going to catch it up top or [Car]Melo was going to catch it on the short baseline, but they kind of covered him and I wasn't going to settle, I was going to get to the rack."
"I got by Kirk [Hinrich] and I was kind of open, so he had to foul me or it was going to be a layup."
Billups made the first free throw and missed the second one on purpose. The Bulls (4-3) were awarded a timeout with .3 tenths of a second left on the clock.
On a great play drawn up by coach Vinny Del Negro, Brad Miller caught an inbounds pass from Hinrich at the key at the top and flicked up a jumper that swished clean through the net.
Game; or so everyone thought.
After ruling the shot good, the referees gathered together and reviewed Millers shot for what seemed longer than the 10 minutes it took trying to come to a determination and after doing so, it was a judgment call that determined Miller still had the ball on his fingertips as the buzzer sounded.
Winners of three straight, the Bulls, who had celebrated and rejoiced a 91-90 win, lost 90-89.
The call wasted another stellar night for Joakim Noah who had 12 points and a career-high 21 rebounds.
"Fortunately I just read the rule a couple of days ago that with three-tenths of a second you can't pivot or turn," said Karl, who got win number 939th to move past Red Auberbach into eighth place on the NBA's all-time list. "It doesn't count. The longer it took, I thought the more it was in our favor. We've talked about missing that second free throw. It's a perfect situation with five-tenths, it's imperfect at six or seven."
Billups had 17 for the Nuggets, while Carmelo Anthony, whose second in the league in scoring, had a season low 20 points.
The Bulls were led by Derrick Rose' 22 points and Luol Deng's 21.
GAME NOTES
The Bulls will traveled to Toronto were there will take on the Raptors (3-4) The Bulls will have their hands full with Chris Bosh, whose averaging 29 ppg and 11.6 rpg.
Tyrus Thomas spoke with reporters after the game and said he is doing light cardio and said "No one believed me, because I was so calm," when discussing how he broke his arm during a weight-lifting session.
Nuggets/Bulls Game Recap
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