In this article, we will talk about the top 5 longest winning streaks in NBA history. The LA Lakers currently hold this record with consecutive 33 wins in the 1971-72 season.
Recently, The Golden State Warriors were on a dream run in the season of 2014-16 with a winning streak of 28 games. Indeed, so complete is their domination of the basketball world that the only time they haven't won a title in this intervening period was when they held a 3-1 lead in the NBA Finals, before losing the last 3 games of the series to LeBron James' Cleveland Cavaliers - allowing one of the most unlikely comebacks in basketball history having made one themselves in the Western Conference Finals against Oklahoma City Thunder. These 5 longest runs are some of the biggest sports picks that are described by pundits as the biggest moments in NBA history.
Let’s start the countdown:
5. Milwaukee Bucks - 20 wins (1970-71 season)
In just their third season in the NBA, the Bucks - led by young superstar center Lew Alcindor and veteran star point guard Oscar Robertson, who they acquired in the 1970 offseason rode their way to the NBA title.
The Big O was done with the Cincinnati franchise which hadn't put together a roster which would allow him to make the Finals he so richly deserved to make. Together with the best center in basketball, the best guard in the game took the league by storm in the duo's first season together. The Bucks won the 1971 NBA Finals 4-0 against a star-studded New York Knicks team, based largely on Oscar's and Lew Alcindor's contributions.
Before that run, they also put together one of the longest winning streaks ever in the regular season. Starting with a 111-85 victory over the San Francisco Warriors on the 6th of February, 1971, the Bucks went on a 20-game rampage that only ended with a 103-110 defeat to the Chicago Bulls. The 20-game unbeaten run from Feb. 6, 1971 - March 9, 1971 being the fifth-best in NBA history.
4. Houston Rockets - 22 wins (2007-08 season)
The Houston Rockets were one of the most fun teams to watch in the league during the mid-2000s. Having enacted a trade to team Tracy McGrady up with future fellow Hall of Famer Yao Ming in the summer of 2004, great things were expected of the duo in historically the most stacked period the Western Conference went through (other than the season about to commence).
Powered by T-Mac's continued excellence, the Rockets put together arguably the most commendable winning streak since the ABA-NBA merger in 1976, winning 22 games on the trot despite missing Ming for about half the games in this run. Ming broke his foot 12 games into this streak and was unable to stage a return from this injury for the rest of the season.
Their streak commenced with a 111-107 win over the Golden State Warriors on the 29th of January, 2008, and was alive for 22 games until a 74-94 loss to eventual NBA champions Boston Celtics on 18th March, 2008.
3. Miami Heat - 27 wins (2012-13 season)
The only team to legitimately pose a threat to the Lakers' win streak was the 2012-13 Heat. The Miami Heat ensemble, having failed at the Finals hurdle, dominated most of its competition en route to a first ring in their second season together (2011-12). The Heatles' Big 3 then entered the following regular season campaign bolstered by 2 seasons of bonding and a peak of LeBron James on one of the most dominant runs in the history of the league.
They won 27 games on the trot, starting from 3rd February, 2013 with a victory against the Toronto Raptors. This streak ended late in March with a defeat to Tom Thibodeau and his Rose-less Bulls cast, as Chicago ground out a 101-97 win at the United Center battling incredible odds.
2. Golden State Warriors - 28 wins (2014-15 and 2015-16 together)
The Golden State Warriors rounded off their dominant 2014-15 season with a run of 4 consecutive wins at the end. Having won the title in the postseason, they came back to the 2015-16 season with a chip on their shoulders - mainly because of the circlejerk that a fully fit Cavaliers team would have beaten them in the Finals.
They set the record for largest incremental margin of victory over the first 4 games of a regular season campaign with a 100 point differential (the 1961-62 Celtics earlier held the record with 99). Curry was playing by far the best basketball of his career, and the Warriors rarely ever needed him to step on the court during the last 3-4 minutes of each game because they'd already guaranteed blowout wins much before that period.
They took their run to 28 successive games with a double-overtime win over the Boston Celtics, before losing to Jabari Parker and Giannis Antetokounmpo's Milwaukee Bucks team on 12th December 2015.
1. Los Angeles Lakers - 33 wins (1971-72 season)
Elgin Baylor might just be the unluckiest player in basketball history. He got bounced out of the Finals each of the 8 times he made it to that stage, and his team embarked on the greatest regular season run of all time just as he went down with nagging knee injuries at the start of the 1971-72 season and announced his retirement.
The power trio of Baylor, West and Chamberlain was the first ever super team assembled in the league. It was the best guard, the best forward and arguably the best center in the league at the time coming together to try and win titles.
The Los Angeles Lakers' 33-game winning streak held the record of longest winning streak in NBA history, beginning with a 4-point victory over the Baltimore Bullets (110-106) on the 5th of November, 1971. It lasted well beyond the Christmas and New Year celebrations, finally being broken by Kareem and Oscar's Milwaukee Bucks on the 9th of January, 1972.
