CHICAGO -- Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau remains frustrated by the fact Joakim Noah remains on a 32-minutes-a-game restriction, but he says he will stick with the directive given to him from the team's front office.

"You go into the game and you know, these are the times that you're going to sub him," Thibodeau said. "If you go back, it's basically the same time every game. Sometimes you hit overtime, that changes things, and so you try and get him out. I try and leave minutes for the fourth quarter, but sometimes it doesn't always work out. And then you have to deal with the game itself. There could be foul trouble, there could be matchups, there could be a run going on. So there's a lot of stuff that goes into it. I tried to do the best I could all year with it. I think he's averaging less than 31 minutes a game, but we're going to adhere to what we're asked to do."

The minutes debate regarding Noah came back to the forefront after Noah didn't play much down the stretch in Sunday's loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder. Thibodeau said the reason for this was because of the fact he ran out of allotted minutes for Noah. For his part, Noah didn't speak to reporters after the game and was not made available after Tuesday's practice.

"We've dealt with it all year," Thibodeau said. "Basically he gets up at the same time every game. Sometimes you don't have control over [the timing]. If there's not a dead ball, he doesn't get out as quickly as you would like. We're short-handed, we're trying to manage it as best we can. Usually it does work out. That's what we're hoping for. We get more guys back, we'll have more depth. So we'll go from there."

Thibodeau acknowledged that he's tried to give Noah some space because he understands that the emotional big man is frustrated by the circumstances and not being able to contribute down the stretch in many games.

"He's a competitor," Thibodeau said. "You try to give him room. I think he understands [the situation]. So that's what we have to deal with."

As for whether or not Thibodeau sees the benefits of a minutes limit, Thibodeau referenced how he handled Derrick Rose's minutes as the former MVP returned from another knee injury last season.

"Even with Derrick, to me, if a guy is not playing up to his ability, it's really not an issue," Thibodeau said. "Because you're not just going to play a guy to play a guy. You want him to play well. So even if you went back to last year, Derrick had no minutes restrictions, I still didn't play him more than 32 minutes. If a guy plays well, and he can play more, great. If not, then he doesn't play. It's not a big deal."