Westbrook goes haywire in 4th quarter as Thunder pull away from Bulls

Last time the Thunder and Bulls tangled, Russell Westbrook dropped in 43 points, but shot an air ball and stepped out of bounds on back-to-back, end-of-game possessions and the Bulls escaped with a win.

Westbrook accepted all the blame for that loss, and seemed determined not to let the same thing happen again. This time around, he made all the right plays down the stretch, including flying in to grab his own rebound off a missed free throw to seal a 109-100 payback victory. 

The Thunder needed Westbrook to be every bit as superhuman as he's been since Kevin Durant went down again nearly a month ago, as they were also without Serge Ibaka due to a sore knee for the second straight game. 

In a contest that see-sawed back and forth from the opening tip, Westbrook found another gear in the fourth quarter. He scored 15 points and added three assists in the frame, directly contributing to 23 of the Thunder's final 28 points.

Credit is also due to the Thunder bigs, who stepped up admirably in Ibaka's absence. Steven Adams and Enes Kanter started together in the frontcourt for the first time and combined for 32 points and 29 rebounds.

It helped that Kanter was able to tap into his inner point guard to make the pairing work.

The Thunder had to survive 27 points from Bulls rookie forward Nikola Mirotic, who himself has had to step up in the absence of Taj Gibson, and another strong two-way performance from Tony Snell, who's been filling in for Jimmy Butler.

At  the end of the day, though, the Bulls could do nothing when confronted with one of the most exciting and unstoppable plays in basketball: Russell Westbrook going coast-to-coast. 

It didn't amount to a triple-double in the end, but Westbrook - who finished with 36 points, 11 rebounds, and six assists - is probably happier to take the W. 

The Thunder nudged themselves a half-game ahead of the Pelicans for eighth in the Western Conference.