EVER SINCE THE Golden State Warriors began to rack up a relentless win streak, the big question was whether they could break the 20-year Chicago Bulls’ record.
In 1996, Phil Jackson’s iconic team featuring the holy trinity of Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and Dennis Rodman, claimed their fourth championship in six seasons after going 72-10 for the regular season.
With just four games to go, the Warriors are 69-9 and have lost two of their last three games.
To break the record, they need to go unbeaten from now until the end of the campaign, which wraps up next week.
Tonight, it could all unravel for them as the San Antonio Spurs visit Oakland. And they will be keen to play party poopers.
Even if they fail to win tonight, the Spurs will get another chance on Sunday when the Warriors come to Texas – where they lost by eight points recently.
The Spurs have enjoyed a terrific season too and are 65-12, the second-best side overall. They’ve played 39 of those games at home and are still to be beaten there.
They’ll will fancy their chances of a possible championship too – their fifth in the last thirteen years.
Going back two decades, the Bulls accomplished something no team had previously done – they won 70 games. They hit the magic number with four straight wins and closed out the regular season with two victories from their final three games.
Even with Steph Curry’s super-human performances, the Warriors have buckled recently. There was the unexpected loss to the Timberwolves while the Celtics got the better of them too. Even their victory over the Utah Jazz came after overtime.
The Warriors’ run has led to inevitable comparisons but the Bulls’ key players from that glorious side are adamant they were better.
Earlier this week, Pippen claimed his Bulls team from 1996 would sweep the Warriors in a hypothetical series.
Bulls in four (games). I don’t think we’d take a night off. I think my size and length would bother Curry a little bit”.
Pippen added that he’d limit Curry, whose points-per-game average for the season is 30, to less than twenty.
Rodman was similarly dismissive.
“The game has changed so much. I don’t think that Golden State can even last or even come close to even playing with us in the ’90s because, back then, you could actually kick peoples’ ass, you could throw punches, you could do all the stuff like that. Now, you can’t do anything. No, I don’t think they can beat us.”
The most interesting aspect to the debate is that the Warriors are coached by Steve Kerr, who was part of that 1996 Bulls’ roster.
He’s become increasingly jaded by the question of which team is better but when the Warriors were on their way to claiming last year’s championship (his first as a coach), he did admit the Warriors lacked one crucial element that the Bulls had.
“We had this guy named Michael Jordan on that team. That year, I think we were 41-3. So if we can go 21-1 the next 22 games, come talk to me.
What I remember that year is there were about 10 games where Michael just decided, ‘We’re going to win,’” Kerr said. “And every other team on Earth would have lost those 10 games. And Michael Jordan was … there’ll never be another one. Nobody has ever come close, and I don’t think anybody ever will. He wanted to break that Lakers record of 69 wins, so he decided we would do it, so we did it. There’s only one Michael.”
And how does Jordan feel about all of this?
He’s remained relatively silent on the topic though according to the Warriors’ Klay Thompson, he has little issue with the reigning champions creating history.
Still, it would appear unlikely at this stage allowing that glorious Bulls side of 1996 to remain immortal.
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I’m not a huge fan of the tap penalty, would lineout and maul not yield greater returns?
@brian o’leary: no guarantee you’ll win the lineout, that the other team won’t sack the maul etc. Tap penalty is the safest option to guarantee possession
@Niall Boyle: correct, but I wonder if there’s any stats available comparing the success rate of the two options?
@brian o’leary: scrum for me all day in that situation. Huge scrummaging machine pushes opposition pack backwards, secures another penalty, play of 8 around the house or 9 to the backline through one or two power phases..a thing of beauty…
@Stuart: ireland got a try from a 5 metre scrum, and two from lineout mauls v italy. We’re not converting from rucks inside 5m as much as we used to, getting held up a lot?
@brian o’leary: I’m still very in the fence about the held up law. It may because it feels like Ireland and Leinster get done by it a lot, which is maybe just my own perception, but it feels way too heavily weighted towards the defence. The attack could put together 5 or 6 great pieces of play to get themselves there and then one guy just needs to do one action to get his body under it and it undoes all of the hard attacking work and sticks you 30/40m back. That feels bad every time.
@Stuart: ireland have a poor record with ref’s and scrum penalties. If the opposition tighthead took a chainsaw to our frontrow the ref would give a penalty against porter for bleeding
Easterby’s best shot at being a 6n’s head coach permanently is with Wales. I think the IRFU will have noticed that the team has got progressively worse over the course of the championship under his watch. Is it all down to Easterby being there instead of Faz, possibly not but as an audition it definitely didn’t go well.
@Michael Corkery: maybe they’ll notice that being without their head coach for a period might not be the best idea, and will say no the next time?
@brian o’leary: Agreed. I think IRFU were wrong to sanction AF going off on Lions jolly at this time when Ireland were going for the 3 championships in a row and building towards WC….he is head coach and this is where he should be…end of. Coaching team need to look at their selection management over the entire 6n campaign.
@Dolores Scully: If the IRFU refused to sanction Farrell coaching the Lions, im pretty sure it wouldnt go down too well with Farrell.
@Jonny Miller: when will they get another chance to do 3 in a row?
Farrell should stay on his holidays if he is not committed.
@Jonny Miller:our coach could be told pre contract that its not an option?
I’m not sure why lions coach need to miss the six nations, he going to be familiar with all the players anyway, and stats can do the rest?
@brian o’leary: at the same time, in terms of succession planning, they got a look at the next man in potentially mid RWC cycle. They should have brought someone like Felix Jones in to concentrate on defense and basically have Easterby do the exact same role as Farrell but he kept his defensive role (which as a result of his attention being elsewhere fell well below the usual standard). For example if Easterby had left, wasn’t replaced and Farrell had to cover defense in his absence. Would we have seen similar regression?
@Dolores Scully: I don’t understand why AF didn’t coach the Irish side during the 6nts ..sat in the stands ? The lions squad are not even together yet…surely the lions gig is at mostly a part time gig at the moment with the administrational/planning stuff?
@Dolores Scully: Building towards a world cup. Same story every year
@Dolores Scully: rubbish there’s November series 25 &26, six nations 26 & 27 and a summer tour in 26 for Andy Farrell to be assessing options before the world cup.
@Oran Burns: maybe our best ever coach and you don’t think he’s committed?
@mark sheehan: well if you want to look at it like that the WC is a 4-year cycle and surely not getting past the quarter final should mean that building/ planning should start straight away. Also, as previously stated here, the 6n is worth a hell of a lot financially to the IRFU…needed to build the squad. And no, as head coach, the team should be front and centre…or is it another case of Sexton’s ” we lost but we won” rubbish.