Chicago Bulls: 5 most dominant postseason performances in franchise history
5. Bulls open 1992 NBA Finals with a convincing win against the Portland Trail Blazers
The Chicago Bulls finished the 1991-92 season with the best record in the league at 67-15. Although they swept the Miami Heat (3-0) in the opening round of the playoffs, their road to a second title was a difficult one, to say the least.
The New York Knicks — a team Chicago had swept in the first round of the playoffs a year earlier — pushed them to a seventh game in the semifinals round. The Cleveland Cavaliers also proved to be a formidable opponent as the teams played to a 2-2 stalemate through the first four games of the conference finals before the Bulls took the series in six games.
The 1992 NBA Finals pitted the Bulls against the Portland Trail Blazers. While the Bulls were making their second straight appearance, this was the Blazers’ second appearance in three seasons. They fell to the Detroit Pistons in five games in 1990.
Being the leaders of their respective teams, the headline matchup coming into this series was Michael Jordan going up against Clyde Drexler. Although Drexler had established himself as one of the premier 2-guards in the league, he was no match for Jordan in this one.
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The Bulls took this game 122-89. Jordan led all scorers with 39 points (including 35 in the first half) and he registered 11 of the team’s 38 assists. Jordan also shot 6-for-10 from beyond the arc. The significance here is that he connected on just 27 percent of his attempts from 3-point range during the season.
On the flip side of the coin, Drexler scored just 16 points on 5-for-14 shooting. While there may have been a debate about which shooting guard was the superior player before this clash began, Jordan left little room for such talk after the series was over as he helped power the Bulls to their second championship on averages of 34.5 points, 6.2 rebounds and 5.8 assists per contest.