The Chicago Bulls are on the crux of a massive retooling effort with a new coach, Tiago Splitter, and even a former key piece of the Knicks championship staff, Jordan Brink. Obviously, that is giving new franchise star, Matas Buzelis, the confidence to provoke Luka Doncic once again. Despite getting stung once, he is refusing to back down from one of the NBA’s most lethal offensive forces.
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While on the Cousins podcast hosted by Vince Carter and Tracy McGrady, he gave his POV on their past on-court exchange.
“He wasn’t really on anything that game at first, and it was… I don’t really want to get into detail because some really nasty things were said, but he just started baking me, bro, like bad. Like 12 in a row, like bad,” Buzelis recalled.
While his immediate post-game reaction back then was to be cautious with Luka Doncic here on, he’s now completely backtracked. The confident youngster declared that he has zero plans to censor himself the next time he crosses paths with the Lakers star.
“I was giving the political answer, but I don’t really care,” Buzelis told the Hall of Famers. “I really need my get back. So, I’ll see him this year. That’s just how I was raised up to play basketball. I was like, ‘I don’t care, keep doing that… keep scoring, like we’ll see if you can keep scoring. And at half, I have 20 at half. So he has 22 at half. So I’m like, I’m chilling.”
Notably, the fateful encounter took place during a March clash at Crypto.com Arena, where the Los Angeles Lakers secured a high-scoring 142-130 victory over the Bulls. While Buzelis put up a solid 22 points, six rebounds, and two steals, Doncic went nuclear. The Slovenian superstar delivered a masterclass performance, exploding for 51 points, 10 rebounds, nine assists, and while knocking down nine three-pointers.
Buzelis vividly remembered a demoralizing step-back sequence that epitomized the night.
“He shot it… I feel like in midair, he points directly down at me, and I’m in the corner and he turns around mid-shot, and it just straight back rim,” Buzelis recounted. “I was like, ‘Oh god, that’s not good’.”
Hearing the story, trash-talk extraordinaire T-Mac offered some wisdom to the young player, too: “You could trash talk. You just got to be able to back it up… Just know what tree you barking up.”
Carter also said if Buzelis can match that same “animosity and venom” in their next battle, he will earn his stripes in the league.
With two matchups scheduled for early 2027, the Bulls forward is eagerly counting down the days until he gets another crack at his rival.