Bulls end road woes in Detroit

1/1/2010

AUBURN HILLS, Mich. - When the Chicago Bulls won in Washington on Nov. 14, they were hoping they'd get their next road victory before Thanksgiving.

Instead, it took until New Year's Eve.

"I wasn't thinking about the streak - I just wanted to get a win," Bulls coach Vinny Del Negro said.

Derrick Rose scored 22 points, and Joakim Noah added 15 points and 21 rebounds to help the Bulls end a six-week road drought with a 98-87 victory over Detroit.

"This feels good," Noah said after Chicago won its third in a row overall. "I think we are just playing better basketball right now for whatever reason."

Rose finished with a point more than Ben Gordon, who joined Detroit from Chicago this summer.

"Ben's role is to score the ball, and I'm playing point guard, so no one said anything about this being me against him," Rose said.

Chicago had lost eight straight on the road, but never trailed while handing Detroit its ninth straight loss. The Pistons (11-21) are 10 games under .500 for the first time since the 2000-01 season, but coach John Kuester was still encouraged.

"I saw a number of positive things out there," he said. "I'm sure people are going to hear that and say, 'You must be kidding,' but we did some good things. We lost Rip [Hamilton], Tayshaun [Prince], and Ben Gordon for extended periods of time, and there's no chance that they were going to come right back in midseason form."

Rodney Stuckey led the Pistons with 22 points despite leaving the game twice in the first half after spraining his left ankle.

"The first time Stuck went down, I was really concerned, because the way he fell, I thought this was going to be another long-term injury for us," Kuester said. "He not only went back in, he hurt it again and he still came back."

Stuckey acknowledged playing through severe pain.

"It hurt a lot - it always does when you sprain your ankle - and then it just gave out on me the second time," he said.