By Associated Press
The Chicago Bulls left the Conseco FIeldhouse with looks of disappointment after T.J. Ford hit a jump shot with 3.9 seconds remaining in regulation to help the Indiana Pacers snag the 107-105 victory Tuesday night.
STATS LLC
INDIANAPOLIS -- T.J. Ford hit the go-ahead jumper with 3.9 seconds left, and the Indiana Pacers beat the Chicago Bulls 107-105 on Tuesday night to tighten the race for the eighth spot in the Eastern Conference.
Chicago had a chance to tie or win, but Ben Gordon missed a long shot that was signaled as a 3-pointer in the closing seconds.
Ford finished with 22 points and nine assists. Danny Granger led the Pacers with 31 points, while Troy Murphy had 15 points and 12 rebounds after missing the previous three games with a strained medial collateral ligament in his left knee.
Derrick Rose had 24 points and a career-high 11 rebounds, Kirk Hinrich had 20 points, seven assists and seven rebounds, and Tyrus Thomas added 20 points for the Bulls.
Indiana won for the fourth time in five games and is 3½ games behind Chicago with seven games left.
Chicago led 103-100 and could have been up by more, but didn't take advantage and failed to score on its next three possessions. Granger scored on a putback to make it 103-102, then the Pacers forced Chicago into a shot clock violation.
Indiana worked the ball to Granger again, and he drained a 3-pointer with 43 seconds left to give Indiana its first lead of the quarter.
Gordon responded with a fallaway jumper from the free-throw line to tie the score with 38 seconds left.
Indiana worked for a shot, and Murphy missed, but the ball went out of bounds off a Chicago player, giving the Pacers a new 24-second clock with 26 seconds to play.
Ford worked the shot clock down, then drove left against Rose before hitting the fadeaway.
The Bulls led 52-50 at halftime, but the Pacers opened the half with a flurry that included a 3-pointer and a reverse dunk by Murphy to take a 59-54 lead with just over eight minutes left in the quarter.
Chicago rallied, and back-to-back 3-pointers by Tim Thomas and Hinrich gave the Bulls a 69-63 lead.
Josh McRoberts' two-handed baseline jam in the final second of the third quarter cut Chicago's advantage to 79-76.
A two-handed dunk and a layup by Tyrus Thomas increased Chicago's lead to 85-78. Indiana rallied again, and a 3-pointer by Granger trimmed the Bulls' lead to 87-85 and caused Chicago to call a timeout.
Chicago responded with a 12-6 run during which four different Bulls scored to take a 99-91 lead.
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