Fabulous NBA finale links 73-win Warriors, Jordan’s Bulls, Kobe’s farewell

Rarely do sports present us with such a tidy, symmetrical picture.

On Wednesday night at Oracle Arena, the Golden State Warriors eclipsed an NBA record that stood 20 years but seemed destined to last forever.

Michael Jordan, the Greatest Player of All Time. The 1995-96 Chicago Bulls, the Greatest Team of All Time.

Who dares challenge that?

No one’s knocking Jordan off his throne any time soon. Not with his six NBA championship trophies and even shinier legend. Even before Jordan hoisted his first Larry O’Brien, His Airness was basketball’s transcendent star.

But the 95-96 Bulls are no longer the NBA’s best regular-season team. How can they be? Not when the 72-10 mark established by Jordan, Scottie Pippen, Dennis Rodman et al just got one-upped by Golden State’s 73-9.

“I just told our guys I’d never in a million years have guessed that that record would be broken,” said Warriors coach Steve Kerr, a guard on that Bulls club.

“I thought it was like (Joe) DiMaggio’s (56-game) hit streak, really, and I was wrong.”

Some 370 miles to the south, in downtown Los Angeles, an NBA superstar whose 20-year career fits snugly in between those Bulls and these Warriors went out in superb style. In his farewell game, Kobe Bryant scored 60 points.

That Bryant needed 50 shots (!) to get there, as well as the Lakers’ 17-65 record, will be mere footnotes in any remembrance.

“You couldn’t write that in a movie script,” marveled Warriors guard Klay Thompson, an unabashed Kobe fan.

Twenty years ago, the Bulls were at their zenith. The 95-96 team, Jordan’s first year back in the NBA after two spent swinging and missing at curveballs, represented the fourth title of his double three-peat.

These Warriors have a ways to go before they can stand shoulder to shoulder with the Bulls’ dynasty. The first step is capping this record-breaking regular season with another NBA title. If they do, they can stake a claim to being the best team since.

It all fits into a neat little box. Twenty years ago, the Bulls were on top. Today, it’s the Warriors. In between, Bryant and Tim Duncan, with five championships apiece, were the best players of their generation.

Now the Bulls’ magic number has been eclipsed and Bryant is off to retirement, where he will almost surely be joined by Duncan.

The guards at Buckingham Palace don’t change with such precision.

Rather than compare the Bulls and Warriors, teams from different eras that played different styles and by different rules, I’d rather point out how similar they are.

Until that Chicago squad came along, all the greatest teams in NBA history were anchored in the middle.

The Lakers had Wilt Chamberlain, who also went 68-13 with the 76ers, followed by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. The Celtics had Bill Russell and, in later versions, Kevin McHale and Robert Parrish. The Knicks had Willis Reed. The Minneapolis Lakers of the 1950s, the first true NBA dynasty, had George Mikan.

The Bulls of the 1990s were the first NBA juggernaut to be led by an off guard (Jordan) and a small forward (Pippen). With apologies to Bill Cartwright and Luc Longley, center was never the center of attention.

Golden State is similar in that its top players are perimeter threats. Centers Andrew Bogut and Festus Ezeli contribute mainly on the defensive end. (Bogut is also an excellent screener and passer.)

The Bulls were the first championship team to de-emphasize the middle, and the Warriors are built in that mold. Except they play a much more free-flowing offense (as opposed to Phil Jackson’s Triangle) with a greater emphasis on perimeter shooting.

How much has the NBA changed over the last 20 years? The 95-96 Bulls made 544 three-pointers as a team. Stephen Curry and Thompson made 678 … as a duo.

“I think the game has evolved a lot, but we have our certain identity of how we play, obviously shooting at a high level, moving the ball. Everybody has a role and we have fun doing it,” Curry replied when asked about the differences between his team and Jordan’s.

“So I don’t know specifically the differences. I know one similarity is we love winning and we love to compete and we love to push ourselves.”

The Warriors proved that beyond any doubt by embracing 73 wins as a goal, not shying away or playing the caution card, but by going full tilt after a supposedly unbreakable record.

And they achieved it.

That’s something to which Jordan can relate, or the closest thing we’ve seen to him since.

“Unbelievable record,” Bryant said during his postgame press conference. “I mean, that’s ridiculous.”

On one night in the NBA, arguably the most captivating we’ve ever seen on the final day of the regular season, it all connects.

This story was originally published April 14, 2016 at 12:51 AM with the headline "Fabulous NBA finale links 73-win Warriors, Jordan’s Bulls, Kobe’s farewell."