On April 21, Beijing time, the NBA playoffs continued, and the Bulls defeated the defending champion Bucks 114-110, pulling the total score to a 1-1 draw. DeRozan shot 19 of 31 in this campaign, blasted 41 points to set a new playoff single-game scoring record, and completed a key layup at the last minute against the block of The Alphabet Brother, which is undoubtedly the number one contributor to the Bulls' victory.
Due to Ball's injury, coupled with the Bulls' 14-game losing streak against the Bucks, the outside world was generally not optimistic about the Bulls before the start of this series. The famous basketball commentator Barkley even said before the game that the Bucks would sweep the Bulls, and an American media also predicted that the Bulls had a 3% chance of advancing in the first round.
In the first leg of the game between the two sides, DeRozan, the Bulls' number one offensive point, only scored 18 points on 6 of 25 shooting, which seems to confirm the perception of the outside world. But DeRozan only uttered one harsh sentence— "I'm not going to vote like that again." ”
And he did do what he said, in this game, DeRozan's desire to shoot is stronger and more determined than in the previous game, especially against Brother Alphabet, his attack is more decisive. According to statistics, in this game, when DeRozan faced the alphabet brother, he only conceded 1 goal in a total of 9 shots and 8 shots, and the continuous unsolved pulling also made the Bucks helpless.
At the last minute of the game, DeRozan rushed to the basket and completed a difficult layup under the interference of the alphabet brother to seal the victory for the Bulls. It was his 41 points of the game and the fifth player in Bulls history to cut a 40+ in a single playoff game after Jordan (38), Rose (1), Ben Gordon (1) and Flynn Robinson (1).
In a post-match interview, DeRozan said, "No one is going to pity us, but we took on the challenge. I want them to watch and I'll try to get the two-pointer to pass. "In the case of the Bulls grabbing home advantage and Middleton suffering a serious injury, perhaps this series that seems to have no suspense will show a completely different trend." If DeRozan can continue to maintain this feel, the Bulls may have a chance to achieve the following gram.