The Miami Heat’s 27-game winning streak ended on Wednesday, after the team lost to the Chicago Bulls 101-97. The team fell six games shy of matching the current record for longest-winning streak, set by the Los Angeles Lakers in 1972.
With the NBA and NHL seasons well underway, and baseball season set to officially kick off, we take a look at teams that were just about unbeatable... and others that probably should have just hung up their uniforms for good.
Notable winning streaks
The Los Angeles Lakers won a record 33 games during the 1971-72 NBA season, before losing to the Milwaukee Bucks in January 1972. The Lakers hold the record for the longest-winning streak in NBA history.
As for hockey, the Pittsburgh Penguins hold the NHL record for longest winning streak, after winning 17 consecutive games in 1993, before tying the New Jersey Devils on April 10, 1993 to end the regular season. The Penguins won three additional games during the playoffs, before losing to New Jersey.
And in 2008, one of the most high-profile winning streaks came to a heartbreaking end when the New England Patriots lost to the New York Giants, 17-14, during Super Bowl XLII. Going into the Super Bowl, the Patriots had a perfect 18-0 record.
Notorious losing streaks
The Detroit Lions made NFL history for all the wrong reasons when they failed to win a single game in 2008. They finished the season with a miserable 0-16 record.
On the ice, two NHL teams share the shame of losing 17 consecutive games: the Washington Capitals in 1975 and the San Jose Sharks in 1993.
Fresh from losing LeBron James to the Miami Heat, the Cleveland Cavaliers set the record for the longest losing streak in NBA history, when during the 2010-11 season they lost 26 straight games.
One of sports history’s most infamous losing streaks came to an end in 2004, when the Boston Red Sox won the World Series, sweeping the St. Louis Cardinals. The last time the Red Sox had won a World Series championship was in 1918.
But teams in a slump should never give up hope, as the Caltech Beavers baseball team proved earlier this year.
The California Institute of Technology’s men’s baseball team snapped a record 228-game losing streak in February, with a 9-7 win against Pacifica University. It had been almost a decade since they last won a game.
The prestigious school, located in Pasadena, Calif., is no stranger to losing. In February 2011, the men’s basketball team ended a 310-game losing streak with a 46-45 win over Occidental College.
And in case you missed it, this is how a team celebrates breaking a 26-year losing streak:
