SALT LAKE CITY -- Michael Jordan showed everyone how the best players win the biggest games.

Jordan, playing despite a flu that had him vomiting until just before game time, scored 38 points and made a huge 3-pointer with 25 seconds left to lead the Chicago Bulls to a 90-88 victory over the Utah Jazz on Wednesday night in Game 5 of the NBA Finals.

Jordan scored 15 points in the final quarter and moved the Bulls within one victory of their fifth championship this decade. They can get it Friday night in Game 6 at the United Center as the series moves back to Chicago.

"Sometimes you've got to come out and do what you've got to do," Jordan said. "We wanted it real bad and me as a leader had to do my best, and hopefully the team would have to rally around me."

The Jazz, who had taken over the momentum in the series by winning the two previous games, got a lesson in making the big plays at the big moments.

And they learned their lesson the hard way by repeatedly botching things down the stretch to have their 23-game home winning streak broken.

Karl Malone scored only one basket in the fourth quarter, shot an airball, a bad airball, on his final attempt with about a minute left and then failed to commit a foul when Utah needed to stop the clock.

Jeff Hornacek missed a 3-pointer with three seconds left that would have tied it and John Stockton, needing to make his first free throw and intentionally miss the second as the Jazz trailed by three with 0.2 seconds left, missed the first.

It was quite a contrast to the way Jordan performed when his team needed him most, even the way he responded to his one mortal moment.

Jordan, whose eyes looked so tired and who spent a lot of time bent over tugging on his shorts, went to the free throw line with 46 seconds left with a chance to put Chicago ahead by one. He made the first and missed the second, then charged into the lane and picked up the loose ball after it was batted around.

The Bulls reset their offense and passed the ball inside to Scottie Pippen posting up, and he threw it out to Jordan when he was about to be double-teamed.

Jordan calmly swished the 3-pointer to give Chicago an 88-85 lead.

"This was a desperation game for us and we just had to contain this team better than we did," Pippen said. "We had to deal with the sickness and injuries and somehow he was able to give us that effort."

Greg Ostertag scored on a dunk to cut Chicago's lead to 88-87 with 15 seconds left, and the Jazz then seemed to brainlock under the pressure.

The Bulls inbounded to Pippen in the backcourt and Malone had a chance to foul him and stop the clock. But Malone, perhaps not wanting to pick up his sixth foul, let Pippen dribble past him.

Before the Jazz knew it, Luc Longley had the ball under the basket for a dunk that restored the three-point lead.

All Utah could do after that was try for a 3-pointer, and Hornacek had to attempt an off-balance one with three seconds left.

After Stockton missed his free throw with 0.2 seconds left, the raucous crowd at the Delta Center filed out silently, knowing that their franchise's best chance for its first title had probably passed.

Jordan, meanwhile, stood under the Jazz basket with his fists in the air as the final buzzer sounded.

"I was really tired, very weak at halftime," Jordan said. "I told (coach) Phil (Jackson) to use me in spurts, but somehow I found the energy to stay strong and I wanted it really bad."

Jordan shot 13-for-27 from the field in matching his highest point total of the series, which he also reached in Game 2. He also had seven rebounds, five assists, three steals and a block.

"I didn't know he was sick. Did everybody else know he was sick?" Utah coach Jerry Sloan said. "I guess I was the last to know. I thought he played a great game."

Pippen had 17 points, 10 rebounds and five assists and Longley scored 12 points for the Bulls, who recovered from a 16-point first-half deficit and an 8-point hole early in the fourth.

"It was a hell of an effort just to be able to come out and play," Pippen said of Jordan. "The effort he gave us today was unbelievable. As teammates, we should have played better basketball, but we really appreciate the way he carries the team.

"He felt like he was going to faint, he was dehydrated, but he gutted it out. We owe this win to him. He did everything he could to carry us."

Malone had just 19 points, his lowest total of the series, and scored only one point in the fourth quarter for Utah, which hadn't lost at home since Feb. 23.

Stockton and Ostertag scored 13 points each and Ostertag had 15 rebounds.

In the first few minutes the Jazz were full of life and the Bulls, especially Jordan, were comparatively listless.

Jordan, who skipped the morning shootaround, had Chicago's first four points but was scoreless the rest of the quarter, and the Bulls trailed 9-8 before Utah started to pull away. A dunk by Shandon Anderson off a scramble for a loose ball started a 12-0 run that made it 21-8. Utah's lead reached 16 points early in the second quarter when Antoine Carr scored on a jumper from the lane to make it 34-18.

"We had to stay patient and try get a little back at a time and not play with a sense of urgency to get back in the game," Pippen said.

Jordan then started taking the ball to the basket rather than settling for jumpers, and he scored six straight points to spur a 19-6 run, ending with a putback by Ron Harper off two missed free throws by Dennis Rodman, that cut Utah's lead to 42-39 and got Chicago right back into the game.

Malone picked up his third foul with 5:06 left in the quarter and went to the bench, and a questionable blocking foul on Stockton with 2:32 left put Jordan on the line for his seventh and eighth foul shots of the quarter. He made both to give Chicago its first lead, 45-44.

The pace slowed down in the third quarter and neither team was able to score 20 points. Malone scored five points before drawing his fourth foul and Rodman had his first basket in three games before drawing his fifth foul and going to the bench with 2:35 left.

The Jazz held a 72-67 lead entering the fourth, and their lead grew to eight before Jordan hit a jumper, a 3-pointer, assisted on a 3 by Toni Kukoc and made another jumper to put Chicago ahead 79-77 with 8:23 left.

The Jazz led most of the rest of the way.

Notes: Faces in the crowd: Charles Barkley, Shawn Bradley, Donald Trump, Wayne Knight, a.k.a "Newman" on Seinfeld, and Wilfred Brimley. --- Bulls owner Jerry Reisndorf, who also owns the Chicago White Sox, missed the game to attend baseball owners meeting in Philadelphia. "If it was 3-1 or 1-3, I'd have to be there. But it's 2-2, so I don't have to be there," he said. --- The Jazz hadn't lost at home to an Eastern Conference team since November 1995. --- The Bulls haven't had a three-game losing streak with Jordan on the team since the first three games of the 1990 season.

Game 5 Box Score

CHICAGO (90)

Pippen 5-17 7-9 17, Rodman 1-1 0-2 2, Longley 6-7 0-1 12, Jordan 13-27 10-12 38, Harper 2-4 0-0 5, Williams 2-8 3-6 7, Kerr 0-3 0-0 0, Kukoc 3-5 0-0 9, Buechler 0-0 0-0 0, Caffey 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 32-72 20-30 90.

UTAH (88)

Russell 4-10 0-0 11, Malone 7-17 5-9 19, Ostertag 5-8 3-4 13, Hornacek 2-11 2-3 7, Stockton 5-10 2-3 13, Anderson 1-2 0-0 2, Eisley 1-3 0-0 2, Morris 4-7 0-0 11, Foster 0-3 6-6 6, Carr 2-4 0-0 4, Keefe 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 31-75 18-25 88.

Chicago 16 33 18 23: 90
Utah    29 24 19 16: 88

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