When you’ve been a Warriors fan for 35 long, painful years, this is the type of season that makes it all worth it.
Sadly, I came on as a fan just a handful of years after the Warriors one Bay Area championship in 1975.
I endured the the “Joe Barely Cares” years, the Chris Webber/Joe Smith failed Number One draft picks, the Latrell Sprewell choke of PJ Carlesimo, and the dark ages of Chris Cohan that felt like they would never end.
I have had glimpses of pure Dubs ecstasy with the Sleepy Floyd 51-point playoff barrage against the heavily-favored Magic Johnson-led Los Angeles Lakers, the Run TMC years and, finally, the #WeBelieve run that shocked the NBA world in 2007.
This regular season, however, has extinguished all other painful seasons, most notably the Cohan era. As our good friend Shailendra Rao writes at the blog he founded during the franchise’s darkest days, Golden State Of Mind:
Back when we started in the spring of 2005 if you told me that some day the Warriors would win 67 games in a single season, I would have said you were a funny, funny, funny character that belonged on Michael Jordan’s team in Space Jam.
This season has opened the possibility to trumping all the other glorious moments combined.
- 67 wins overall.
- 39 wins at home.
- 28 wins on the road.
- Number one seeding overall in the NBA.
- Number one offensive field goal percentage.
- Number one defensive field goal percentage.
- Numerous top individual award possibilities including MVP (what?!?), Coach Of The Year, Defensive Player Of The Year, and Most Improved Player
- 46 games ahead of the hated Lakers (even in a bad Laker season — say that again out loud!).
There’s only one crucial and vital “cherry” to put on top of the greatest regular season in Warriors history.
An NBA championship on the 40th anniversary of the one title by the Bay would cement the greatest season in fan history.
(Photo @letsgowarriors Instagram account via @smallflybox)
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