2011 NBA Playoffs: Derrick Rose, Chicago Bulls Come Back To Edge Indiana Pacers

The Chicago Bulls' 104-99 comeback victory over the Indiana Pacers in the first round of the NBA playoffs on Saturday can be summed up in one of three words, depending on your perspective.

If you're just a fan of the NBA or another team, that word is "Wow!" If you're a fan of the Bulls, that word is "Whew." If you're a fan of the visiting Pacers, that word is "(insert your favorite expletive here)."

For 47 minutes and 12 seconds, the Bulls could not take the lead on the Pacers (actually, if you go back to the last time the teams met, on March 18 during the regular season, it was more like 87 minutes). When they finally seized it, they didn't let go.

The key factor to the Bulls' comeback win was Derrick Rose, who scored 39 points in the game—a career postseason high.   

With 4:52 remaining in the opener of the seven-game series, Rose went in hard to the basket and, depending on which broadcast you were watching, was either a "good hard foul" or a flagrant by Tyler Hansbrough.

The refs thought it was the former. Luol Deng thought it was the latter and let Hansbrough know about it.

Deng got whistled for the technical, but Darren Collison missed the free throw. Deng exhorted the crowd, and to 130-decibel MVP chants, Rose trimmed the lead down to three points, and it was apparent it was time for the "comeback." 

Deng explained after the game that he didn't think it was a dirty foul but that "it's part of their game plan to not just foul him but to really whack him." There were a lot of hard fouls on Rose, who went to the stripe 21 times—seeing your star take a beating like that might get tiresome. 

The Pacers had seen that movie before, though, and weren't interested in the sequel. They ran off seven unanswered points in 45 seconds. It started to feel like the Pacers' lead was inevitable when Hansbrough stole the ball from Boozer and made the dunk with the and-one to culminate the run. 

At 3:28, Deng sank a pair of free throws to cut the lead down to eight. Then, after Hansbrough missed on their next possession, Chicago came back down and Noah raced ahead on the miss. Rose absolutely blistered a pass that hit Noah in stride a step from the rim, and Noah got the dunk but missed the and-one.

Now down to 2:27, the 10 point lead was down to a far more imposing four. 

Indiana came down, and Noah made a smart foul on Roy Hibbert as the shot clock expired. Hibbert split the free throws. 

Then Derrick Rose split the entire Pacers team, made the bucket, and got the and-one. Lead two. 

Collison missed short. Rose comes down and, with 1:27 on the clock, made an "I-don't-know-what-else-to-call-it-360-step-back-floater." All I can tell you about that shot, aside from that, is the reaction by announcers on both stations. On ESPN one announcer was just laughing.

On CSN, Tracy Morgan actually didn't even know what to say except "Big time...plays"

It was just flat out silly. The game was tied, and the crowd was involved. 

The Pacers came down and missed the shot, and the Bulls came back. With 50 seconds on the clock, Rose drove into the lane.

Literally every single Pacer was there to stop him, and he kicked the ball to a wide open Kyle Korver, who set down his magazine, stretched, and sank the three-point shot to the sound of 22,000 deliriously screaming Chicago Bulls fans. 

Danny Granger missed another three, and then Derrick Rose came back and sank another pair of free throws to score his 38th and 39th points of the game. McRoberts tried a jumper, Noah blocked it. McRoberts tried another. Noah blocked it.

Rose had six boards and six assists to go with his 39 points. He became the only Bull other than Michael Jordan to accomplish that feat. Jordan did it 11 times. Rose also had three blocks.

The only players to score 35 and add six rebounds, six assists, and three blocks are LeBron James, Pau Gasol, Tim Duncan, Shaquille O'Neal, Vince Carter and Hakeem Olajuwon. Carter and Rose are the only guards to do it, and Rose is the only point guard to do it. 

Other standout performers for the Bulls were Luol Deng, who scored 18 and had 10 boards, and Joakim Noah, who also had a double-double with 10 points and 11 boards to go with three blocks.   

The Pacers deserve a tremendous amount of credit for their effort. Tyler Hansbrough was absolutely unconscious for most of the game (even if he didn't have a concussion when his head hit a teammate's knee), and scored 22 points. Danny Granger had 24 points. Darren Collison had 17 and nine assists. His drives were the catalyst for the Pacers offense.

Indiana coach Frank Vogel deserves a lot of credit too.

He came out with a tremendous game plan, and the Bulls had a far better battle than they'd expected. He exploited the one weakness in the Bulls defense, the area between the lane and the three-point line. 

He also had the quote of the year on Derrick Rose.

"The kid's out of this world," he said. "You've got Allen Iverson's speed, Jason Kidd's vision, Chauncey Billups' shooting and Michael Jordan's athleticism. How do you guard that?"

The problem is that it's hard to imagine the game going much better than it did, and they still lost. The Bulls do know, though, that eight-seed or not, the Pacers plan to do battle in this series. 

Game 2 will be Monday at 8:30 p.m. EDT.