Matas Buzelis isn’t satisfied with his shooting.
This shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who has been around — or listened to — the Chicago Bulls forward for the last couple of years. Buzelis isn’t satisfied with anything yet. He doesn’t like losing. He can’t stand it when he struggles with tough defensive matchups such as Los Angeles Lakers star Luka Dončić.
But entering his third NBA season, Buzelis is particularly concerned with figuring out his shot. The key, he believes, comes down to striking the right balance.
“I was shooting a little too many 3s last year,” Buzelis said Monday during media day. “I’ve been focusing on getting downhill and getting to the midrange more. Putting on weight and getting stronger has been one of the key factors for me this offseason.”
Bulls forward Matas Buzelis poses during media day at the United Center on Sept. 28, 2026. (Stacey Wescott/Chicago Tribune)
Buzelis took 495 attempts behind the 3-point arc last season. He made 173, a 34.9% rate. That was a slight dip from his rookie percentage (36.1%), albeit with an 86% increase in attempts. He also shot 66.1% at the rim, a number that was significantly boosted by his efficiency as a dunker, with dunks accounting for nearly 40% of his total shots at the rim.
This shot diet reflected an ethos hammered by former coach Billy Donovan — shoot at the rim, shoot behind the arc or don’t shoot at all. Donovan gently criticized Buzelis’ propensity to lean into his midrange jumper, noting that the inefficiency of the shot had driven it out of most players’ shooting profiles, barring a few exceptions such as DeMar DeRozan.
Buzelis took only 19 non-paint, 2-point shots last season. (He took 17 as a rookie despite taking 408 fewer total shots.) Midrange shots accounted for 161 of his 963 shots (16.8%). In many ways, that was a healthy shot selection for a young player still learning to locate his spots on the court. But Buzelis feels the balance swung too far from his preferred shot in the heart of the half-court.
Coach Tiago Splitter isn’t ruling out the midrange shot for Buzelis just yet. But he also doesn’t want Buzelis to shy away from the arc, an area where the Bulls need to vastly improve to keep up with the high-octane offenses of the NBA.
“I like good 3s,” Splitter said. “If he’s forcing 3s, that’s not a good thing. I also don’t think he cannot shoot midrange. That’s not how I see it. But sometimes the midrange is a bad shot for that specific play. We’re just going to be smart. He’s overthinking it a little bit. Just play basketball.”
One thing is for certain: The Bulls need Buzelis to shoot more. He averaged the sixth-most attempts on the team last season, lagging behind both fellow offensive leaders such as Josh Giddey and midseason acquisitions such as Collin Sexton. If Buzelis is going to thrive in this rebuild, he needs to assert himself in the offense through shot-taking.
Splitter doesn’t believe in a set formula for selecting those shots. He wants Buzelis to improve his strength so he can finish through contact at the rim without relying on dunks. He also wants Buzelis to learn how to read close-outs so he can more efficiently move through all three levels rather than forcing shots behind the arc or in the midrange.
Each of these improvements reflects a wider area of growth — an overall improvement in Buzelis’ discernment.
“Sometimes midrange is the best shot you take in a possession, but that’s not necessarily the best PPP (points per possession) that you want to take in a game,” Splitter said. “In general, layups, fouls, corner 3s, catch-and-shoot 3s — those are the best.
“But sometimes you might have to take a pull-up 3 or a pull-up 2, so it’s hard. You’ve got to read every play and then make a decision of what’s a good shot, what’s a bad shot.”
This understanding of what defines a good or bad shot created a push-pull dynamic the last two years between Buzelis and Donovan’s coaching staff. Buzelis wanted to take more midrange pull-up jumpers. Donovan wanted to work that tendency out of a young player with other options. Despite the pair’s strong relationship, they never fully saw eye to eye on the issue.
Splitter shrugged off this dynamic. It doesn’t affect him, in his view, because he wasn’t here last season. He needs to build his own relationship with Buzelis, one in which the forward can trust himself on the court.
And for his part, Buzelis believes this could translate into a more diverse shot selection in Year 3.
“I feel like I’m going to have a little more leeway of how I play than last year,” he said.
That doesn’t mean complete freedom. Splitter doesn’t plan to take a lax approach with his youngest players. He wants them to learn from mistakes, but he also doesn’t intend to feed selfish or lazy habits. How he will enforce these expectations will be a learning process for both coach and players in the first year of their partnership.
Still, the Bulls have more room for error this season. They’re playing for long-term goals, not short-term gains. That means Buzelis can spend the season figuring out his ideal blend of shots — while also learning his place in the greater scheme of Splitter’s system.
“There’s always a role that you play when you play sports,” Buzelis said. “Everyone’s going to be playing their role, but there’s going to be a leash as always. You can’t go over your role. It’s going to be very, very strict on what we have to do, and that’s what it takes for winning basketball.”