LOS ANGELES -- Jimmy Butler called his shot before Sundays 118-110 win over the Los Angeles Lakers. The Chicago Bulls All-Star swingman knew he would have to score more on Sunday with the Bulls playing without Dwyane Wade, who was sitting out the game to rest on the second night of a back-to-back.So Butler, who is averaging 24.0 points per game this season, told his head coach, Fred Hoiberg, that he would take matters into his own hands as the Bulls tried to bounce back from a tough loss to the Los Angeles Clippers on Saturday night.He told me before the game, Coach, Im going for 40 tonight, Hoiberg said. And he did it.Butler finished the game with a season-high 40 points, going 14-for-23 from the field and 12-for-14 from the foul line. He also added seven rebounds and six assists in 40 minutes. In a month full of dominating performances, Butler saved his best game of the short season when his team needed it most.He is playing with a tremendous amount of confidence, and thats where it starts, Hoiberg said. If you believe you can do it, thats a pretty good place to start. Jimmy thinks every time he steps on the floor hes the best player out there, and more often than not hes right. Thats a big thing is the confidence and the belief in yourself, and he definitely has that.Butler doesnt want to acknowledge publicly that he feels he is the leagues best player, but that is the mindset he has taken with him on the floor over the past few weeks. He has scored at least 20 points in eight straight games.I think thats the way I have to think, Butler said. If I dont, then I look at it as being just another player thats out there. My teammates tell me to play like that, to think like that, but at the same time even though D-Wades out, hes still helping me through this process and letting me know what I should be doing. Late in the game, early in the game, its great to have him in my corner.As for his prediction before the game, Butler playfully smiled after being told of Hoibergs words.Butlers performance without Wade is even more impressive when compared to LeBron James numbers while playing without the future Hall of Famer. As ESPN Stats & Information points out: In 55 games LeBron played without Wade, he scored 40 three times. James didnt do it until his 14th game without Wade. Butler did it his first time out.I just felt like thats what my team was going to need from me to tell you the truth, Butler said. For me to be aggressive, to put the ball in the basket, with our second-leading scorer out, I knew I had to pick up the pace a little bit. So that was my mindset. Play defense as well but go out and put the ball in the hole.Butlers teammates figured that the 27-year-old was ready to have a big game.Before the game, before the ball jumped up, he came to me [and] just said, Come on, lets get it done, Bulls forward Taj Gibson said. I saw it in his eyes, the desperation and understanding that we got to win this game. This is a big game for us, especially on a back-to-back after losing a tough one which we thought we should have won [Saturday] night, so I saw it in his eyes. He was intense, [Rajon] Rondo was intense, but hes just showing more leadership day by day.The Bulls are now 3-1 on their annual Circus Trip and play the Denver Nuggets on Tuesday night. Balenciaga Pas Cher Chine . 4 Villanova with a 96-68 drubbing on Monday. Wragge hit 9-of-14 from behind the arc, matching Kyle Korvers school record for 3-pointers in a game set in 2003, as Creighton (16-3, 6-1 Big East broke a conference record with 21 treys in the rout. 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TORONTO -- Sixty minutes into the World Cup of Hockey and the American plan, so meticulously mapped out, is in tatters.All the talk of identity and character and imposing their will on opponents was swept aside by the shocking results of the teams tournament-opening 3-0 loss to Team Europe on Saturday.The loss, of course, was disastrous, putting the Americans in the position of pretty much having to beat host and pre-tournament favorite Canada on Tuesday (8 p.m. ET, ESPN) to have a legitimate chance of advancing from the three-game preliminary round.But it was the manner in which this game was lost that is most disheartening and calls into question almost every aspect of this team, from how it was originally selected to the game plan envisioned and even to the personnel decisions for the opening-game roster. This is not a marathon, as coaches always talk about in NHL seasons, this is a sprint, Team USA head coach John Tortorella said. Weve put ourselves in a spot, now were chasing. Were chasing the tournament. Its a spot we didnt want to be in. Its a very dangerous spot, but we are here. We just need to stay together and not blow ourselves up here, have a couple of good days of practice and get ready for our next opponent and try to do better.Hes right, of course.The Americans still control their own fate.The Americans split two pre-tournament games with the powerful Canadians, but what we saw from Team USA Saturday afternoon suggests they are a long way away from where theyll need to be to beat Canada and revive their hopes of advancing.What was supposed to be a hard-driving, blue-collar group of players who would push the pace and exact a toll physically on any and all opponents was inexcusably flat-footed throughout the first two periods.They missed assignments, and while they allowed only 17 shots on goal, they inexplicably allowed multiple odd-man rushes that allowed a surprisingly disciplined, patient Team Europe to score early in both the first and second periods and carry a 3-0 lead into the third.An American team that eschewed more talented offensive players Phil Kessel, Tyler Johnson, Kevin Shattenkirk and Justin Faulk in order to be a team that would be harder to play against was shockingly passive until it was too late.Through the first two periods there might have been two consecutive shifts that revealed that kind of hockey.Not the start that we had drawn or had anticipated, said veteran Zach Parise, who earned a silver medal with Team USA at the 2010 Olympics, but who was also part of a 2014 Olympic team that was shut out in their final two games in Sochi, Russia.Saturdays shutout loss now counts three straight goalless outings in best-on-best tournaments for the Americans.Parise noted there has been a significant gap between Sochi and the start of the World Cup of Hockey.If we got shut out every game this tournament, then we can talk about it, Parise said. Then he paused.You know what? You kind of look back at those games in Russia, and uunable to get one, and then unable to get one tonight, so yeah, weve got to do a better job as forwards as a group, he acknowledged.ddddddddddddAfter going 0-for-4 on the power play and failing to get one of their 35 shots past European goalie Jaroslav Halak on Saturday, the decision to leave hard-shooting defenseman Dustin Byfuglien off Saturdays roster seems ill-conceived. Likewise, its easy in the wake of the loss to second-guess the decision to have grinding winger Justin Abdelkader in the lineup ahead of Kyle Palmieri, who scored 30 goals for the New Jersey Devils last season.Of course, if the players who were in the lineup had executed the game plan successfully, well, the story would be different, no?But they didnt.Captain Joe Pavelski led the team with five shots but has yet to find his stride.Brandon Dubinsky took a double minor early in the third period with a needless high stick on Zdeno Chara behind the Team Europe net, and Ryan Kesler, whose agitating presence is key to American success, took two minor penalties in the first half of the game.Defending NHL scoring champ and league MVP Patrick Kane had four shots on net but continued his struggles offensively on the international stage. His turnover at the Team Europe blue line led to an embarrassing 2-on-0 goal by Leon Draisaitl that gave Team Europe a 2-0 lead in the second period.Thats a play that Ive made a million times in my career, Kane said. Just kind of lost the puck, and the next thing you know, they go down 2-on-0. Thats unacceptable from me. But at the same time throughout the game we had chances, we had looks, just didnt really seem to get a break in that game, which is unfortunate because that was a huge game for us.And lets be very clear on one key element: Team Europe was full value for this victory.Marian Gaborik, Frans Nielsen, Draisaitl, Roman Josi and, of course, Halak, had strong games. And a team that began the pre-tournament schedule being embarrassed by Team North America has now beaten Sweden and the U.S. in back-to-back games.Weve come here to play nine periods, and like everybody else, we want to play next weekend, a defiant Team Europe head coach Ralph Krueger said.So that was from the get-go the reason for us to be here. We didnt see ourselves as just a sideshow ever. This group has always been building to do this, what happened today.Sideshow? Far from it. Team Europes victory Saturday reinforces that things like identity arent forged by words but by confronting adversity. And while many believed Team Europe would be easy prey for teams like Canada and, yes, the United States, their commitment to their plan and to their teammates has dramatically altered the narrative of this tournament.Now Team USA has until Tuesday to figure out a way to alter a storyline that right now looks like it will end very quickly at the World Cup of Hockey. 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