{"id":305225,"date":"2025-11-24T08:44:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T08:44:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/305225\/"},"modified":"2025-11-24T08:44:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T08:44:11","slug":"bulls-notes-buzelis-essengue-smith-vucevic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/305225\/","title":{"rendered":"Bulls Notes: Buzelis, Essengue, Smith, Vucevic"},"content":{"rendered":"

Matas Buzelis<\/a> has embraced the physicality and gritty style of play demanded by the Bulls and head coach Billy Donovan, writes Joe Cowley for the Chicago Sun-Times<\/a>. The transformation began in the offseason, when Buzelis added 10 pounds of muscle in preparation for stepping into a starring role for Chicago.<\/p>\n

\u201cI said before the season started that this would be a great year of growth for him because he\u2019s going to see things he hasn\u2019t seen his rookie season,\u201d Donovan said. \u201cThe thing I love about Matas is he leans into it and he\u2019s eager to improve.\u201d<\/p>\n

The second-year forward has raised his averages is nearly every meaningful category so far in his second NBA season. He\u2019s currently contributing 14.1 points, 5.6 rebounds, and 1.4 blocks in 27.8 minutes per game, and he\u2019s embracing the increased focus that comes from his newfound status on the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost of the time the best defender is guarding me and that puts a target on my back,\u201d Buzelis said. \u201cI like that, that\u2019s how I\u2019m going to get better and stride forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

We have more from the Bulls:<\/p>\n

After being selected 12th overall in the 2025 draft, Noa Essengue<\/a> finally made his NBA debut in the Bulls\u2019 16th game of the season. The patience he displayed in waiting for his chance to take the floor extended to his first stint on the floor, according to Julia Poe of the Chicago Tribune<\/a>, who notes that a single missed field goal represented Essengue\u2019s only contribution to the box score in four minutes of action. Still, he wasn\u2019t discouraged by the outing or by the time it took to get there. \u201cIt was nice to get on the court with my teammates since I\u2019ve worked two or three months now,\u201d Essengue said. \u201cI just enjoyed it. I know I don\u2019t got a lot of time so I just tried to enjoy every moment.\u201d\u00a0Even that brief appearance provided Donovan with some insights to take away. \u201cI\u2019d like to see him get his motor going a little bit more,\u201d the Bulls\u2019 coach said, \u201cbut I was happy I could throw him in there for a few minutes.\u201d
\nDonovan hinted that Jalen Smith<\/a> will likely be in the rotation even when Zach Collins<\/a> returns<\/a> from wrist surgery, reports Joel Lorenzi of The Athletic, who says\u00a0(via Twitter<\/a>) that Donovan compared it to how the Spurs and Cavaliers use their big men. \u201cWe may have to look at two bigs together some, or playing three bigs rotationally,\u201d Donovan said. \u201cI think we gotta find what\u2019s best to play all three.\u201d\u00a0Smith has performed well for the 9-7 Bulls, averaging 10.1 points and 5.9 rebounds in just 16.4 minutes per night while shooting 37.1% from three.
\nThe Bulls came out of Saturday\u2019s game against the Wizards with a one-point win, but Nikola Vucevic<\/a> was unimpressed by the team\u2019s mentality, writes Lorenzi for The Athletic<\/a>. \u201cFor three quarters, we were very soft,\u201d Vucevic said. \u201cWe gave no resistance. We didn\u2019t do anything that we talked about. Just played really soft. It was really bad\u2026 I don\u2019t think we understand that it\u2019s just not sustainable to play this way.\u201d Buzelis, whose celebration of the victory irked Vucevic during a post-game interview (Twitter video link<\/a>), conceded his teammate\u2019s point when he spoke to reporters a little later. \u201cHe believes that we should beat that team by a lot more, and I totally agree with him,\u201d Buzelis said. \u201cHe has every right to be upset. We have to be better, for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Matas Buzelis has embraced the physicality and gritty style of play demanded by the Bulls and head coach…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":305226,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,155547,8639,34713,174027,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-305225","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-basketball","11":"tag-jalen-smith","12":"tag-matas-buzelis","13":"tag-nikola-vucevic","14":"tag-noa-essengue","15":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=305225"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305225\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/305226"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=305225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=305225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=305225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}