CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Dwyane Wade can see the flaws. In his 14th NBA season, the future Hall of Famer knows what is ailing his Chicago Bulls squad, but as has been the case so often during a brutal stretch of games that has seen the Bulls drop eight of their past 11, Wade and his teammates can't seem to fix the issues before it's too late.

"Every game we have, there's moments pretty much besides the Milwaukee game [in] Chicago, we're doing things the right way on both ends," Wade said after a 103-91 loss to the Charlotte Hornets Friday night. "And then there's moments when we're not on both ends. It's just not enough consistency. We have to get to the point where we decide, as a team, to be more consistent in what we do -- in our coverages, in the way we run the offense. We're not going to make shots all the time. But we have to shoot our shots. We have to get back in transition and make them see as many defenders as possible. But defensively we just got to ... we make small mistakes. And those small mistakes in this league can tear you up. We did that tonight, and they were able to capitalize on it. We played good D overall, it just wasn't good enough."

Dwyane Wade and the Bulls lost Friday for the eighth time in their past 11 games. Jeremy Brevard/USA TODAY Sports

In watching the Bulls lately, an argument could be made that both the offense and defense have serious problems. The defense failed the Bulls down the stretch Friday, but it was the offense that created a big hole in the second quarter. The Bulls shot just 6-for-23 in that frame and never found a rhythm throughout most of the night. After acknowledging following Wednesday's loss to the Washington Wizards that the Bulls' offense was too predictable late in games, Wade said after watching the tape again that he believes the Bulls are just missing the shots they are getting.

"I think in going back and watching the film of the last game, sometimes when you're out there you think you might see something," Wade said. "But then when you go watch the film, you see something a little different. I'm not mad at the shots we're getting. We're just not making enough of them. Some of them, yeah, are tough. Some of them are forced. Every team takes those. But I'm not mad, for the majority of it, the shots that we're getting, honestly we're just not making enough of them at this point in the season."

Bulls head coach Fred Hoiberg tried to put a positive spin on the offensive woes, saying that the Bulls got going in the second half after giving Taj Gibson some touches in the paint, but the reality is the same as it ever was for a Bulls team that can't find the right answers. Hoiberg was more honest is his assessment of Niko Mirotic's uneven play Friday. The struggling forward was just 5-for-16 from the field and 1-for-7 from beyond the arc. Hoiberg said he had a message for Mirotic during the game.

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"I said, "Niko, everyone on this bench believes in you, man," Hoiberg said. "'You got to step up and shoot that ball when you have the open one.' He just missed a couple. Human nature as a shooter is to start thinking, but you can't play that way. When a shot's available, you have to step up and rise up with confidence and knock it down."

The Bulls haven't been knocking much of anything down lately as they continue to sputter toward the new calendar year. The microcosm of those struggles came at the end of the third quarter when Hoiberg's group couldn't even get a shot up before the end-of-quarter buzzer, despite the fact that they had 21.8 seconds left on the shot clock after a Mirotic rebound. In a season full of high highs and low lows, the Bulls head into a Christmas Day visit to the San Antonio Spurs in need of a small basketball miracle with their season on the verge of coming apart at the seams.