The Philadelphia 76ers set the wrong kind of record Friday night.
The team lost to the Houston Rockets, powered by James Harden’s 50 points, 116-114. The defeat makes it 27 in a row. Friday’s two-point loss follows a defeat in Boston by just four points, so the 76ers at least as of late keep it close.
The 2013-14 Philadelphia 76ers and 2010-11 Cleveland Cavaliers both lost 26 straight games. But the 2015-16 76ers play better at being the worst. In fact, the 27-straight losses betters in worse the Louisville Colonels (MLB, 26 straight losses) and the Tampa Bay Bucanneers (NFL, 26 straight losses), too. No franchise in the major North American sports boasts (boasts?) a record of losing for so long.
Despite a rumor holding that the “76ers” nickname refers to the last year Philadelphia emerged victorious in a regular season game, Breitbart Sports confirmed through research of yellowing box scores that this grapevine supposition is not true.
The 76ers last won a regular season game on March 25 against the Denver Nuggets. Caitlyn Jenner still went by Bruce then. The number-one movie at the box office that week, The Divergent Series: Insurgent, came out on DVD more than four months ago. Scott Walker remained a frontrunner for the Republican nomination on March 25 by recently topping a Quinnipiac national poll, leading in a PPP survey taken that week, and subsequently coming out ahead in a count by Fox.
The 76ers dribble on to descend more valleys.
At 0-17, they play one loss away from tying the NBA record for most defeats to start a season. They travel to Memphis to play the 9-8 Grizzlies on Sunday. On Tuesday they attempt to not make history against the Los Angeles Lakers. The 2-12 team plays as the worst in the West. And with Philadelphia hosting, the 76ers stand chance of moving from undefeated to the win column.