42–4: Only One Other Team in History

With yesterday’s 127–107 victory over Dallas led by Klay Thompson’s 45 points, they are now a game up on the 1995–96 Bulls that finished 72–10. After losing game 46 to drop to 41–5, the Bulls won 7 straight to reach 48–5. Therefore, Golden State would need to push their current win streak from 5 to 12 to stay a game ahead at 49–4. Their next 7 games include hosting Oklahoma City and Houston. Since the Warriors opened with 24 straight, they’ve had streaks of 5 and 7 wins in addition to their current 5 game streak.

Yes, the Warriors (42–4) have a better record than the 1995–96 Bulls at this point in the season. However, they’re not alone for the best record through 46 games. The 1966–67 Philadelphia 76ers were also 42–4 and managed to reach 46–4 before losing to the Boston Celtics. That loss was the first game in a five game stretch where the Sixers went 1–4. They finished “only” 68–13 for the best record in history at the time and 4th best full regular season currently. We can only speculate on whether the 76ers might have managed to win a couple more games if they had been chasing a team rather than setting the pace.

Oh, by the way, with yesterday’s thrashing of the Rockets, the Spurs are now 39–7. That is the same record the 1972–73 Celtics had through 46 games on the way to a 68–14 record, the 5th best complete regular season in history. Golden State and San Antonio are still on pace to post the best combined regular season records in history as shown in the table below.