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By Jamal Laoudi
Washington, D.C. – In sports, records and achievements play an important role in defining and establishing legacies for both teams and players. Furthermore, they are used as the ultimate standard.
The National Basketball Association (NBA) has some interesting records and phenomena, some may even be described as unbelievable. Case and point, did any player ever won both the scoring title and the Defensive Player of the Year Award in the same season, emphasis on the same season? “No way?” That was my initial reaction but, it happened. If you had to pick a name, you would probably match my pick and name Michael Jordan; you would be right. He did so in the 1987-88 season.
Here is another one, any player ever scored a triple double in every game for the entire season? I’ll spare you the suspense and say yes, Oscar Robertson. He did so in the 1961–62 season when he averaged 30.8 points, 12.5 rebounds and 11.4 assists per game.
Until April 13, 2016, the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls, led by Michael Jordan, had held the record for most wins during a regular season with 72 wins and 10 losses. The Golden State Warriors, led by Stephen Curry, broke that record and it is now 73 win and 9 losses, an incredible achievement!
As far as what Jordan’s reaction before the breaking of the record, Warrior’s power forward Draymond Green said that Jordan told him during the NBA All Star Weekend to “Go win the record. Go get the record. If y’all don’t win this record, I’m going to be hot, and I’m blaming you.”
After the record was broken, Jordan released a statement where he said “I want to congratulate the warriors on their amazing season…records are made to be broken… I look forward to seeing what they do in the playoffs.” The Chicago Bulls organization itself and former Bull Scottie Pippen also congratulated the Warriors.
With this end of season, the Warriors have also managed great firsts and achievements. The Warriors are now the first team to ever score over 1000 threes in a single season, with Curry leading the pack with a record of 404 threes. To illustrate how impressive this is, consider that the second place of most threes made in a single season belongs to Ray Allen’s with 269 threes back in the 2005-06 season.
If any credit the Chicago Bulls attempt to take from this Warriors’ 73-9 record is that the Warriors were led by head coach Steve Kurr, a member of the record-breaking 1995-96 Bulls team.
It is noteworthy that the record-breaking game, which scored an overnight rating of 2.6, a record outside Christmas Day games, was broadcast on ESPN after the latter bumped to ESPN2, arguably, an equally important game: Kobe Bryant’s final game in the NBA where he dropped an “impressive” 60 points.
