Schemes & plays to look for in the Raptors-Bulls play-in game

An X's and O's preview of what to expect for Wednesday's play-in game

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As I wrote in my most recent post over a year ago, Noh’s Notebook is still in hiatus while I focus on my full-time job covering the league at-large for Sporting News. I do miss my Bulls coverage though, and for whatever reason people are still subscribing to this mostly-dead newsletter. So perhaps I will throw in a post now and then for people who want my random Bulls thoughts emailed to them (please do not pay for a sub, everything here will be free!).

On that note, I went back and rewatched the most recent game that the Bulls and Raptors played. These two teams are very similar in a number of respects. Here are their ranks (Bulls | Raps) after the All-Star break:

• Deflections: 2nd | 1st

• 3-point makes: 25th | 28th

• Offense: 13th | 18th

• Defense: 4th | 2nd

• Record: 12-10 | 12-10

The season series went to the Raptors 2-1, but the point differential was only one (314-313 Raptors). I expect a fairly competitive, grimy game.

I’m a bit of a scheme nerd, so I made a little YouTube video on what the coverages were / what to expect.

For a little bonus content, I went back and also rewatched the first and second games (not included in the video). The Raptors went to some box-and-one on DeMar DeRozan in that first game and played a lot more 2-3 zone, so there’s a chance they might break that out again. They really loaded up on DeRozan and Zach LaVine in all three games (LaVine missed the first one), living with the rest of the team getting open looks.

The success for the Bulls is going to boil down to if their role players can hit some open 3’s (yikes), or if they can brick slightly less than the Raptors (much better prognosis there).