Written by Mike Rosenberg at The Comeback
This NBA season has been defined by one stat: zero losses for the Golden State Warriors.
The defending champions extended their regular season win streak to 27 games (dating back to last season) in Indiana Tuesday night and are now off to a NBA record-best start of 23-0. But that tells only part of the Warriors hot start: here are 14 stats–most of which are rather, shall-we-say, unique–that help explain just how crazy their season has been.
- Most dominant team ever, so far
The Warriors aren’t just winning – they’re crushing teams. They have outscored their opponents by a combined 335 points this year and are on pace for a season-long point differential of plus 1,194. The best season ever was the 1971-72 Lakers, who finished +1,007 vs. their opponents to a 69-13 record.
In per-game terms, the Warriors are winning the average contest by 14.6 points, or about two points per game better than that record Lakers season. Only two teams in the last decade have even gotten to a point differential of +10 per game: the 2007-08 Celtics (10.3) and last year’s Warriors (10.1). The Warriors’ figure will drop if they ever lose a game, of course. They’ll definitely lose a game. Right?
- Warriors can coast the rest of the way
Let’s say the Warriors want to rest their key guys and get ready for the playoffs now. Golden State has actually built up such a cushion in their first six weeks that they could lose a majority of their games the rest of the way (by going 29-30) and still finish with the No. 2 seed (behind the Spurs) if the other Western Conference teams continue their current pace.
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