Dominant teams in the NBA seem to appear every once in a while and establish some tremendous runs of victories. Just last year, in the 2019-20 NBA season, we saw the Los Angeles Lakers and Milwaukee Bucks put up tremendously dominant performances.
The Lakers' won 24 of their first 27 games, while the Bucks started their year with a 46-8 record before the All-Star break, including an extraordinary run of 18 consecutive wins.
As impressive as the Bucks' run of 18 straight wins last year was, they only tied for 11th place in NBA history. Below, we will take a look at the five longest winning streaks in NBA history, and the list includes some all-time great teams that went on to win the title.
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Most consecutive wins in the history of the NBA
The most recent team to go on an unbelievable run of consecutive wins in the regular season was the 73-9 Golden State Warriors, when they started the 2015-16 campaign with a 24-0 record after winning the 2015 NBA title.
In this report, we will tell you which teams constructed the biggest game-winning streaks in NBA history.
Without further ado, let us start.
#5 1948 Washington Capitols and the 1970-71 Milwaukee Bucks - 20 consecutive wins
Between the NBA's second and third seasons, when the league was called the Basketball Association of America (BAA), the Washington Capitols put together a run of 20 consecutive wins. At the end of the 1947-48 season, they won their last five games of the regular season before losing a Western Division Tiebreaker and falling out of contention.
The team then won their first 15 games of the 1948-49 season. That run of consecutive wins was untouched until the 1970-71 Milwaukee Bucks with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Lew Alcindor) and Oscar Robertson tied it with 20 straight wins between February 6th, 1971, and March 9th, 1971.
The Bucks, coached by Larry Costello, went 66-16 in the regular season and won the championship after sweeping the Baltimore Bullets in the NBA Finals. Abdul-Jabbar won his first regular-season MVP that year (as a sophomore) and also won Finals MVP.
#4 2007-08 Houston Rockets - 22 consecutive wins
The Rick Adelman-led 2007-08 Houston Rockets made it into the NBA history books after winning 22 consecutive games in the regular season. At the time, that streak was the second-largest in NBA history and only the second to surpass the Capitols and Bucks' previous record of 20 straight wins.
Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming were the best players on those Rockets and even though they each missed more than 20 regular-season games, they helped the Rockets achieve a 55-27 record, the fifth-best in franchise history.
#3 2012-13 Miami Heat - 27 consecutive wins
Fresh off winning his first NBA championship in 2012, LeBron James guided the Miami Heat to the best regular-season record in franchise history during the 2012-13 season.
The defending champions went 66-16 in the 2012-13 regular season and LeBron James took NBA MVP honors. Also, from February 3rd to March 27th, 2013, Miami won 27 consecutive games to post what was at the time the second-longest game-winning streak in NBA history.
Ultimately, Miami went on to win the 2013 NBA championship, coached by Erik Spoelstra and guided on the court by James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, and Ray Allen's memorable season-saving three-pointer against the San Antonio Spurs in game six of the 2013 NBA Finals.
James won the Finals MVP.
#2 2015 Golden State Warriors - 28 consecutive wins
The Golden State Warriors won the 2015 NBA championship after a sweet 67-15 regular season in the 2014-15 campaign. Then, they started the 2015-16 season with a 24-0 record (best-ever record to start a season). Four consecutive wins to close the 2014-15 regular season gave the Warriors 28 consecutive regular-season wins, the second-longest streak in NBA history.
Ultimately, those Warriors posted a record-breaking 73-9 regular-season with Stephen Curry winning his second MVP in a row (the first unanimous MVP in NBA history).
However, their dream season ended with a heartbreaking failure for the Warriors as they fell in the 2016 NBA Finals against LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers.
#1 1971-72 LA Lakers - 33 consecutive wins
The 1971-72 LA Lakers posted a seemingly impossible record with 33 consecutive wins during that campaign.
On their way to winning a then record 69 games, Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry West, Gail Goodrich and others won 33 straight games between November 5th, 1971, and January 9th, 1972.
On October 31st, the Lakers were 6-3 in their first nine matches of the year, and they improved to 39-3 when the 33rd win arrived.
Ultimately, they went 12-3 in the 1972 NBA Playoffs and won the championship after beating the New York Knicks in a five-game NBA Finals.
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