With 10 minutes 41 seconds left in the fourth quarter, Washington Wizards point guard Gilbert Arenas shouted to his teammates on the bench, "We've got to get over the hump!" After playing lethargically for most of their game against the Chicago Bulls, the Wizards finally came out on top in the final three minutes, when center Brendan Haywood showed some restraint, then hammered down a vicious two-handed dunk to give his team the boost it needed to win, 95-88, last night at MCI Center.
The victory gave the Wizards (10-5) their best start since 1974, when the Washington Bullets started the season 11-4 and went on to win a franchise-record 60 games. To win last night , the Wizards needed to overcome an 11-point second-half deficit.
Gilbert Arenas moves toward the basket as Bulls' Tyson Chandler watches. Arenas scored 34 points, and the Wizards rallied from an 11-point deficit.
(Nick Wass -- AP)
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"It's easy to say that you want to be on top. We were down, but we fought back. It was tied. Then we was down three, down two," said Arenas, who led the Wizards with a season-high 34 points. "Brendan actually broke it open with that dunk, from there we just fed off of that."
The last time the Wizards played the Bulls, in the preseason, Haywood uncharacteristically threw a punch at the Bulls' Antonio Davis, then backpedaled until he got into a wrestling match with Davis that led to a three-game suspension to start the season. He was placed in a similar position yesterday.
With the game tied at 81 with 2:55 left, Haywood fought for an offensive rebound and got tangled with Bulls forward Tyson Chandler, wrestling for the ball until he hit the ground. Chandler then towered over Haywood, shouting harsh words toward him. All the while, one thought ran across Haywood's mind. "I don't feel like giving [NBA disciplinarian] Stu Jackson and the league $60,000 again," he said.
The officials, who called a jump ball, separated players and prevented the incident from escalating. Haywood won the tip, then he caught a pass from forward Jared Jeffries along the baseline and blasted off toward the rim.
"It was a situation that easily could've turned ugly. It could've been worse" than the brawl that occurred in Chicago on Oct. 27, Haywood said. "I just raised my hands because I didn't want any problems."
Forward Antawn Jamison (14 points, 13 rebounds) followed with two free throws, then Jeffries banked a three-pointer off the glass with one minute left, sending the announced crowd of 16,332 into a tizzy and his team to its first four-game winning streak in two seasons.
The Wizards, who have claimed seven of their past eight games, won an ugly game in which they shot just 35.3 percent and got outrebounded 50-35.
"Does it have a 'W' on there for the Wizards?" Coach Eddie Jordan asked. "That's pretty to us. We gutted it out. It was different sort of win. That was just character and willingness to hang in there."
Arenas kept the Wizards in the game on a night when Jamison (5 of 18) and Larry Hughes (18 points on 4-of-15 shooting) couldn't get going offensively. Jamison caught an elbow late in the second quarter and needed two stitches under his right eye, but he managed to hit a jumper in the fourth quarter to give the Wizards their first lead of the second half at 81-79.
And, Hughes made up for his shooting on the defensive end, where he had a career-high tying seven steals. "It was like, all of our scoring power, we left it in Atlanta," when the Wizards matched their season high with 114 points the night before, Arenas said. "It's hard when" Jamison and Hughes aren't scoring.
Arenas scored 17 points in each half, capping the first half by driving around Bulls backup guard Frank Williams and swooping into the lane for an impressive one-handed dunk. "Usually at home, I practice my celebration dance, but I didn't pull it out tonight," Arenas said. "My fault."
Chandler moved aside to give Arenas a clear lane for the dunk, but the slim 7-footer made his presence felt all night. Chandler came off the bench to score 15 points and grab a season-high 21 rebounds. And with 2:36 left in the game, Chandler was standing in the lane to contest Haywood on the dunk. "I saw Tyson there, so I tried to finish it a bit harder," Haywood said.
