Stephen Curry has the MVP award for this NBA season locked down. He could sit out for the rest of the regular season and still win the hardware, but why would he rest when his team has a legitimate shot to set the record for most wins in a regular season? He shouldn’t.
The star point guard for the Golden State Warriors has averaged 30 points per game, 6.6 assists, and 5.4 rebounds per game this season. Although he has shown signs of fatigue of late, he still has his team in position to win the Western Conference and possibly set the record for most wins ever in a regular season.
Maybe things would be different if the Golden State Warriors had not won the NBA championship last year, but since they did, and Curry, Klay Thompson, Draymond Green and the other star players on the Warriors roster all have rings, they can afford to take a chance and chase the record of 72 wins in a regular season. Nobody can ever make the argument that Curry wasn’t truly great because he never won a ring, as we all had to listen to about LeBron James until he finally won a championship in Miami. With a ring on his finger already, Curry and his teammates should attempt to do something that has never been done before — win 73 or more games in a season.
The record in and of itself is preposterous. With just an 82-game season, how can any team expect to lose so few games? Then the Chicago Bulls accomplished the un-accomplishable in 1995-96 and won 72 games en route to winning their fourth of six titles the franchise would win in the 1990s.
I admit that most players and franchises are judged by the number of championships they win, but a champion is crowned every year. The NBA has been in existence since 1946. That means there are nearly 70 teams who have won a championship. How many teams have won more than 72 games? None, unless the Warriors do it in 2016.
The Warriors sit at 66-7, meaning that they cannot lose more than two of their nine remaining games in order to set the record and can only lose three games to tie it. Two of the games left on their schedule are against the San Antonio Spurs, the second-best team in the league and one that is certainly capable of beating the Warriors. Throw in two more games against the Memphis Grizzlies, one against the Portland Trail Blazers and one versus the Washington Wizards, three teams desperate to improve their seeding for the playoffs, and the Warriors are left with little room for error.
No matter who the Warriors play in the first round of the playoffs — it will likely be the Mavericks, Jazz or Rockets — Golden State should cruise to a victory. They should sweep the series, probably rest Curry play in the fourth quarter of any games, then use their extra days off to recover as the rest of the league slugs it out in series that might take all seven games.
Most other teams would rest their stars in this situation. The most refreshing thing about the Warriors is that they aren’t like most other teams. Play on, Golden State.