How Joakim Noah's playmaking has rallied the Bulls

As anyone who's followed this NBA season knows, Tom Thibodeau and the Bulls are doing what they do again. No Derrick Rose again? No Luol Deng after a mid-season trade with the team in the dumps? No problem.

Since falling to a 12-18 record after a New Year's Eve home loss to the Raptors - a week before trading Deng - the Bulls have gone 21-8 in 2014, a mark that matches the Pacers for best in the Eastern Conference and trails only Houston's 19-6 mark. Thanks to that run and the rest of the Conference's incompetence, Chicago now sits in a third-place tie with Toronto, two games clear of fifth-place Washington for home court advantage in the first round of the playoffs.

Given what we've seen and come to expect from Thibodeau's undermanned team over the last couple of years, perhaps it should come as no surprise that the Bulls look like a likely second round team again. Minus an MVP and a former All-Star, it shouldn't come as a surprise to see Joakim Noah emerge as the unquestionable leader of this team, either.

What is surprising, however, is watching how Noah is leading his team, as the 6-foot-11 center has become the premier facilitator of the Bulls' offense. Noah remains an elite defensive player (second in defensive rating behind Paul George) and rebounder (top five in rebounds per game, top 10 in rebound rate). He's even chipping in a career-high 12.1 points per game, but it is his passing ability that's wowing fans this season, as the two-time All-Star is legitimately carving up opposing defenses with his smart and sometimes even flashy passes.

Here are a few examples from Noah's incredible 14-assist game against the Knicks yesterday afternoon:

You'll see Noah and the Bulls execute this often, as he'll hand the ball off to a shooter, in this case Dunleavy, while setting a screen for said shooter to curl around and shoot:

He’ll feed the paint and thread the needle from around the perimeter:

He'll alertly find shooters moving towards the corners:

Heck, he'll even take the opposing center off the dribble before finding his cutting point guard:

Again, that's a near seven-footer casually going between his legs before dropping a dime, and this wasn't an All-Star game.

In truth, Noah has always been a solid passing big man, steadily increasing his per-game numbers from 1.1 as a rookie all the way up to 4.7 in this, his seventh season. His passing display over the last few weeks has been absolutely ridiculous, however, averaging 7.4 assists in his last 11 games (Bulls are 9-2), including two 11-assist games, a 13-assist game and the 14-assist game against the helpless Knicks we just went over. On the season, only eight players - all point guards - are averaging more than 7.4 assists.

On the advanced side, Noah has assisted on 23.9 percent of made Bulls field goals when on the court this season (assist percentage) and 25.7 percent of his possessions are ending with an assist (assist ratio). His 62.2 passes per game, according to SportVU, are more than point guards like Jrue Holiday, Deron Williams and even Rose (in the 10 games the Bulls point guard played in this season). It's no wonder then that the Bulls score just 94 points per 100 possessions without Noah, but 101.2 per 100 possessions with Noah on the court.

At 29-years-old now, his individual offense will likely never place him among the game's best scoring bigs, but Noah's total package of defense, rebounding and playmaking easily places him among the league's most complete players and certainly among its most complete centers in recent memory, as he's on track to become the first five-man since David Robinson in 1993-94 to lead his team in total assists.

The Bulls are finding a way to not only survive, but thrive in the absence of Derrick Rose again, and this season they're doing it without Luol Deng to eat up 40 minutes per game for Thibodeau. Joakim Noah is the biggest reason why, leading the charge on both ends of the floor and showing that just because the Bulls are without their star point guard again, it doesn't mean that they are without a star playmaker.

(GIFs courtesy of NBA.com/stats boxscore video)