There’s no question it’s been a brutal playoffs for Carlos Boozer, who seems lost mentally now and being booed at home.

“I just want to make the shots that I had blocked,” said Boozer. “I’m just going to keep on playing.”

The fans cheered when Taj Gibson replaced him late. Players and coaches were asked about it and rallied to Boozer’s defense. Or defense of his offense.

“Carlos is giving us everything he has,” said coach Tom Thibodeau. “He’s nicked up. He’s playing hard. He’s on the boards. The rebounding is huge. We need that rebounding. His offense will come around.”

Joakim Noah addressed it in post game comments, and clearly was annoyed. He paused for several seconds before answering, and later expressed resentment about the questioning of Boozer.

“I think it’s very hard sometimes,” said Noah. “Our home crowd, it (can be) a tough place to play. We have a lot of love for our crowd. Through tough times we’ve got to stick together. I’ve been in this position before. My rookie year I was booed. It’s tough being booed in front of the home crowd. It’s important for us to stick together. We’re trying to represent this city, this team as well as we can. We’ve got the MVP. Derrick is doing a great job being a leader and representing he city. With Carlos, people have to understand he’s playing through an injury right now. He’s giving us what he’s got. He’s somebody who has an unbelievable presence. He opens up a lot of things for us. Sometimes people are quick to bash one player. But this is a team and we know we need Carlos to get where we want to go.”