Neighborhood News: The Chicago Bulls begin their 61st season
This week, the Chicago Bulls begin their 61st season as an NBA franchise. New Bulls coach Tiago Splitter told Sports Illustrated that he has made clear that he is a hard-nosed head coach who values physicality.
Meanwhile, the Bulls have made clear that they are in a rebuilding phase, setting their sights on player development during the 2026-27 campaign, per SI.
Players from Matas Buzelis to Dailyn Swain stressed how aggressively this group plans to play defensively. The Bulls, according to Sports Illustrated, want to put more pressure on the ball, blow up pick-and-rolls, and play higher up in the halfcourt.
In the Beginning
The Chicago Bulls were founded before the game had three point shooters or a 24-second clock, in January 1966.
The franchise was founded by Dick Klein, the only owner in Bulls history to have played professional basketball, having previously played for the Chicago American Gears. Klein served as the team’s general manager and president during its formative years.
Why name them the Chicago Bulls?
Klein, according to Wikipedia sources, chose the name because Chicago was known as “the meat capital of the world.” As NBA.com notes, the name denoted strength and power, and it tied in to the city’s meatpacking tradition and the Chicago Amphitheater’s (first home court of the Bulls) proximity to the famed Chicago Stockyards.
And…the one-syllable directness of the Bulls was also in line with Chicago’s other team nicknames—Bears, (White) Sox, Cubs, and (Black) Hawks.
The First Years
It’s to Klein’s credit, as well as the Reinsdorf family, that the franchise exists and thrives in the city. The Bulls were the third NBA team in Chicago’s history, following the Chicago St1946–1950) and the Chicago Packers/Zephyrs (1961–1963).
In their inaugural 1966–67 season, the Bulls played their first game on October 15, securing an upset victory over the St. Louis Hawks. Coached by Johnny “Red” Kerr, they finished the season with a 33–48 record, the best by any expansion team in NBA history at the time, and became the first (and only) expansion team to qualify for the playoffs.
Klein left and the Bulls hired GM Pat Williams. Under Williams and head coach Dick Motta, the Bulls made the playoffs for four consecutive seasons, including setting a franchise record of 57 wins in 1972. During this period, the team relied on key players Jerry Sloan, Bob Love, Chet Walker, and Norm Van Lier. The Bulls made their first appearance in the conference finals in the 1973–74 season, losing in four games to the Milwaukee Bucks. They also made the conference finals in the 1974–75 season but lost to the eventual NBA champion Golden State Warriors in a 4–3 series.
1984–98: Michael Jordan era, “The Team of the Decade”
As NBA.com recounts, the Bulls’ fortunes greatly elevated in 1984 with the drafting of Michael Jordan, the dominant player of his era and greatest player of all-time, along with Scottie Pippen, a perennial All-Star who was also voted among the NBA’s 50 greatest players of all-time.
Jordan won five MVP awards and seven straight scoring titles while featuring a combination of exciting slam dunks and late game heroics.
In the early 1990s the Bulls added Coach Phil Jackson, as well as a deep core of players, which included Horace Grant, Bill Cartwright and John Paxson, and went on to win three consecutive NBA titles 1991, 1992 and 1993 at the Chicago Stadium.
Two years later Jordan and Pippen were joined by Dennis Rodman, Toni Kukoc and Ron Harper to win three more titles in 1996, 1997 and 1998 at the United Center. The 1996 team, which won a record-breaking 72 games, is considered by most to be the best team of all-time.
The Bulls’ six NBA championships, and second “Three-peat” of the 1990s, cemented them as the “Team of the Decade” and perhaps the best to ever play.
Today “Nothing is written in stone”
As Yahoo Sports notes, the Bulls are looking to rebound from a 31-51 season under Billy Donovan that saw them finish 12th in the Eastern Conference.
Despite their record, Chicago played at the second-fastest pace in the entire NBA (102.5) and ranked 12th in scoring at 116.3 points per game.
The Bulls unveiled a new coach and staff, a new management team, a new starting five, and the confidence and conviction that it’s a new day.
Coach Splitter is, like his Bulls predecessor, an advocate of playing fast and shooting a lot of three pointers, according to NBA.com.
“Nothing is written in stone yet,” said Splitter, to NBA.com. “Going to see how they (the players) react to this game (Phoenix Suns vs. Chicago Bulls, 10/6). How they react reading the game, how they’re going to attack, how they’re going to be physical, how they will guard pick and roll, one on one, closeouts.”
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Alison Moran-Powers and Dean’s Team Chicago
