Derrick Rose and the Chicago Bulls Plow Their Way to the NBA's Best Record

With the final day of the NBA regular season over-and-done with, the Chicago Bulls enter the playoff chase with the NBA's best record at 62-20.

Going into Wednesday night's action the Bulls and the Spurs were deadlocked for the league's top record. In the final game, the Bulls pulled out a comeback victory over the Nets, with mainly a bench effort down the stretch.

The Bulls' bench out-scored the Nets' bench 50-26—led by sharpshooter Kyle Korver's 19 points, going 7-13 from the field.

As for the Spurs, they went without Manu Ginobili much of the game as he exited with a possible hyper-extended elbow early in the game. That didn't stop the Spurs from making the game go down to the last possession against the Phoenix Suns, where the Spurs ultimately lost 106-103, ending up with a 61-21 record.

This the fifth time the Bulls have held the top spot heading into the playoffs, not achieving such a feat since the glory days of Michael Jordan and the 97-98 season—in the previous four seasons the Bulls not only held the best record in the league, they won the NBA championship in each of those seasons.

The Bulls closed out the regular season with a nine-game winning streak, going 24-4 after the All-Star break.

Now the Bulls can turn their focus to the Indiana Pacers, their first round opponent—whom they went 3-1 against in the regular season—and who are already stirring things up in the press.

Pacers guard Danny Granger said he'd rather face the Bulls instead of the Celtics if he had a choice, saying: "They go as Derrick Rose Goes. If you make a concentrated effort to stop Derrick Rose, you have a better chance of beating them."

Bulls center, Joakim Noah stood up for his teammate saying, "All right, slow him down then, it's easy to talk about it. I haven't seen too many people slow him down yet, so maybe he can do it."

Rose also chimed in on the situation stating, "My teammates, they're around me. I think we play good together. That's his opinion. I've got winners on my team and winners know how to win."

The Pacers are looking to get inside the head of the Bulls before the series starts, but coach Tom Thibodeau is sure to keep the players in check, keeping their focus on getting the win in game one, then onto the next one.

Thibodeau said of the Bulls 62-20 record, "It means we had a pretty good season, but now we start at 0-0"

Source: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/665356-derrick-rose-and-the-chicago-bulls-plow-their-way-tto-the-nbas-best-record

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