Derrick Rose showed no effects of his injured left ankle as the Chicago Bulls pushed their way past the Indiana Pacers with a 116-89 first-round playoff series-ending rout on Tuesday.
Rose, who sprained his ankle on Saturday, sprung back to action with 25 points and the top-seeded Bulls put away the Pacers in a 4-1 best-of-seven series victory.
Meanwhile, the defending champion Los Angeles Lakers took a 3-2 series lead after they stung the New Orleans Hornets with a 106-90 victory, while Orlando kept their series alive with a 101-76 blowout of the Atlanta Hawks.
Photo: Reuters
The Bulls will meet the winner of the Hawks and Magic matchup after winning just their second playoff series since 1998.
“I’m speechless right now,” Rose told reporters. “I really can’t believe it. It’s a great accomplishment. I’m happy for my team mates and my coaching staff.”
Chicago had battled through four close games with Indiana, but ran away in Game Five.
Photo: Reuters
The Bulls grabbed a 30-19 third-quarter advantage that gave them an 84-65 lead heading into the fourth.
Luol Deng finished with 24 points to support Rose and Chicago held the visitors to 39 percent shooting.
Danny Granger led the way with 20 for Indiana.
Photo: Reuters
Despite the loss, the Pacers showed some positive signs, reaching their first post-season since 2006 under coach Frank Vogel, who took over mid-season for the fired Jim O’Brien.
The Los Angeles Lakers pushed New Orleans to the brink of elimination by using a balanced attack on Tuesday to defeat the Hornets in Game Five of their NBA playoff series.
Kobe Bryant played through the pain of a sore ankle to score 19 points for the Lakers.
Andrew Bynum finished with 18 points and 10 rebounds, and Pau Gasol chipped in 16 points for the two-time defending NBA champion Lakers.
“They were beating us to 50/50 balls back in New Orleans, so that was a conscious effort by us to win those balls tonight,” Lakers center Bynum said. “We all played defense tonight and kept them to 90 points.”
Los Angeles got off to a slow start on Tuesday against the seventh seeded Hornets, who got a 22-point performance from Trevor Ariza.
Chris Paul, who has been their best player in the series, had 20 points and 12 assists for the Hornets. New Orleans has lost three of four since shocking the Lakers in Game One.
Game Six is today at the New Orleans Arena.
The Hornets made 61 percent of their shots in the first half, but could not duplicate the feat in the second.
Bryant was at his vintage dunking best on Tuesday as the Lakers led 54-51 at the half.
Paul answered with his own superb play and scored seven points in the final two minutes of the opening half..
In the other Eastern Conference game on Tuesday, the Orlando Magic staved off elimination by beating Atlanta to set up a Game Six.
Jason Richardson and the Magic staved off elimination as the shooting guard scored 17 points to lead the Magic to a dominating win over Atlanta.
“We’re a good shooting team,” Magic coach Stan Van Gundy said. “This is more of us than what we showed in the first four games. This isn’t an aberration. We’ve been doing this for four years. The first four games were the aberration.”
JJ Redick came off the bench to finish with 14 points for the Magic in Game Five of their best-of-seven playoff series.
The Magic are trying to become just the ninth team in National Basketball Association history to rebound and win a playoff series after being down three games to one.
The last team to do it was Phoenix who fought back to beat the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round of the 2006 playoffs.
Magic center Dwight Howard was held to just eight points and eight rebounds as he battled foul trouble throughout the contest.
Josh Smith led the Hawks with 22 points as they shot below 40 percent from the field for just the second time these playoffs.
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