The best teams that didn’t win an NBA championship

No team was more disappointed to see the NBA suspend its operations on March 11 than the Bucks. Milwaukee was in the midst of its finest season in franchise history and appeared to be hurtling towards its first NBA Championship since 1971. If the 2019-20 season is indeed cancelled, as many fear, the Bucks will join these five star-crossed teams as the best squads to fall short of winning a title.

5. 1991 Portland Trail Blazers (63-19)

The 1990-91 Trail Blazers had everything you’d want in a championship team. Clyde Drexler provided the scoring, Terry Porter supplied the ball-handling, Buck Williams did the dirty work, and Clifford Robinson was the proverbial spark off the bench. The Blazers had the league’s second best offensive rating and third best defensive rating and were, in many ways, the perfect team. There was just one issue: they couldn’t polish off the Lakers.

Portland lost two games to L.A. during the regular season and had two more go into overtime. That trend continued in the Western Conference Finals, where the third-seeded Lakers polished off the heavily favored Blazers in six games. It was another dismal end to an otherwise brilliant season.

4. 1985 Boston Celtics (63-19)

You’d be hard pressed to find a more stacked team than the 1984-85 Celtics, whose roster featured four future Hall of Famers and a former Finals MVP in Cedric Maxwell. The defending champs cruised to a 63-19 record during the regular season and ran roughshod over the Cavaliers, Pistons, and Sixers in the Eastern Conference Playoffs, setting up an eagerly anticipated rematch with the Lakers in the NBA Finals.

Game 1 couldn’t have gone much better for the Celtics, who decimated L.A. 148-114 in what would become known as the "Memorial Day Massacre." It was, at the time, the most lopsided victory in Finals history, and it prompted the Lakers to come out swinging. L.A. won the next two games and finished off the series in six contests thanks to the phenomenal play of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who averaged 25.7 points, 9.0 rebounds, and 5.2 assists per game. Boston would win again the following season, but 1985 belonged to L.A.

3. 2009 Cleveland Cavaliers (66-16)

The 2008-09 Cavaliers was the kind of team that could bore even hardcore fans to tears. Cleveland ranked 13th in points per game and 25th in pace and had a tendency to pound the air out of the ball. It was seldom pretty, but it was effective. Mike Brown’s methodical, slow-it-down approach led to 66 victories and an .805 winning percentage as the Cavs held opposing teams to a paltry 91.4 points per game.

Cleveland’s stingy D led to series sweeps of the Pistons and the Hawks, but the Cavs' lack of offense finally caught up to them in the Eastern Conference Finals against Dwight Howard and the Magic. Orlando held Cleveland to 90 points or less in three games and won the series 4-2.

2. 1973 Boston Celtics (68-14)

Boston won 11 championships over a 13-year span from 1957 to 1969, but none of those teams came close to amassing as many victories as the 1973 Celtics, who achieved a sublime .829 winning percentage. Red Auerbach's crew finished the year second in points per game and first in defensive rating thanks to the stifling D of league MVP Dave Cowens and tireless wings Don Chaney and John Havlicek.

The Celtics were heavy favorites to win the championship before falling prey to the 57-25 Knicks in the second round. Led by Walt Frazier and Dave DeBusschere, New York won the series by seven games and defeated the Lakers to capture their second championship in franchise history.

1. 2016 Golden State Warriors (73-9)

NBA fans knew they were in for something special during the 2015-16 season when the Warriors raced out to a 24-0 record. Steph Curry and Co. didn’t just beat teams, they robbed them of their will to compete. 20-point blowouts were the norm as Golden State rained down threes with alarming accuracy.

The Warriors didn’t lose back-to-back games all year and finished first in the NBA in points, field goal percentage, three-point percentage, offensive rating, and plus/minus. In fact, that last category wasn’t even close. Golden State’s plus/minus was 21 points higher than the last place 76ers.

Golden State barely broke a sweat against Houston, Portland, and Oklahoma City in the Western Conference Playoffs, and raced out to a seemingly insurmountable 3-1 lead over Cleveland in the NBA Finals. And that’s when the wheels fell off. The Cavs began pounding the Warriors’ smaller frontline and, against all odds, the Warriors dropped the next three games. Their epic defeat remains one of the few black marks on Curry’s otherwise glowing resume.

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